On heavenly winds that waft her to the sky,
Float the sweet tones of star-born melody;
Wild as that hallowed anthem sent to hail
Bethlehem's shepherds in the lonely vale,
When Jordan hushed his waves, aud midnight still
Watched on the holy towers of Zion hill!

Soul of the just! companion of the dead!
Where is thy home, and whither art thou fled?
Back to its heavenly source thy being goes,
Swift as the comet wheels to whence he rose ;
Doomed on his airy path awhile to burn,

And doomed, like thee, to travel, and return. Hark! from the world's exploding centre driven, With sounds that shook the firmament of heaven, Careers the fiery giant, fast and far,

On bickering wheels, and adamantine car;
From planet whirled to planet more remote,
He visits realms beyond the reach of thought;
But, wheeling homeward, when his course is run,
Curbs the red yoke, and mingles with the sun!
So hath the traveller of earth unfurled

Her trembling wings, emerging from the world;
And o'er the path by mortal never trod,
Sprung to her source, the bosom of her God!

Eternal hope! when yonder spheres sublime Pealed their first notes to sound the march of time,

Thy joyous youth began-but not to fade-
When all the sister planets have decayed;
When wrapt in fire the realms of ether glow,
And heaven's last thunder shakes the world below;
Thou, undismayed, shalt o'er the ruins smile,
And light thy torch at nature's funeral pile !

THE CONVICT.

Campbell.

The glory of evening was spread through the west,
On the slope of a mountain I stood,

While the joy that precedes the calm season of rest
Rang loud through the meadow and wood.

'And must we then part from a dwelling so fair ?'
In the pain of my spirit I said;

And with a deep sadness I turned to repair
To the cell where the convict is laid.

The thick-ribbed walls that o'ershadow the gate,
Resound, and the dungeons unfold:

I pause, and at length through the glimmering grate
That outcast of pity behold.

His black matted head on his shoulder is bent,
And deep is the sigh of his breath,
And with stedfast dejection his eyes are intent
On the fetters that link him to death.

'Tis sorrow enough on that visage to gaze,
That body dismissed from his care;

But my fancy has pierced to his heart, and pourtrays
More terrible images there.

His bones are consumed, and his life-blood is dried,
With wishes the past to undo;

And his crime, through the pains that o'erwhelm him de

scried,

Still blackens and grows on the view.

When from the dark synod, or blood-reeking field,
To his chamber the monarch is led,

All soothers of sense their soft virtue shall yield,
And quietness pillow his head.

But if grief, self-consumed, in oblivion would doze,
And conscience her tortures appease,

'Mid tumult and uproar this man must repose In the comfortless vault of disease.

When his fetters at night have so pressed on his limbs,

That the weight can no longer be borne, If, while a half slumber his memory bedims,' The wretch on his pallet should turn.

While the gaol mastive howls at the dull clanking chain, From the roots of his hair there shall start

A thousand sharp punctures of cold sweating pain,
And terror shall leap at his heart.

But now he half raises his deep-sunken eye,
And the motion unsettles a tear; -

The silence of sorrow it seems to supply,
And asks me for why I am here.

'Poor victim! no idle intruder has stood,

With o'erweening complacence our state to compare,

But one whose first wish is the wish to be good,
Is come as thy brother thy sorrows to share.

At thy name, though compassion her nature resign, Though in virtue's proud mouth thy report be a stain, My care, if the arm of the mighty were mine,

Should place thee where yet thou may'st blossom again.'

Wordsworth.

BALLAD,

IN IMITATION OF THE ANCIENT STYLE.

Why dost thou weepe, O gentle Ladye? Why dost thou grieve, O Ladye fayre ?

Why is thy lovelye baby presste

In anguish to thye throbbing breaste? And why that look of black despayre ? Why dost thou sit forlorne and sigh? Sweetest Ladye, tell me why.

I have cause to weepe, kind stranger,
I bave a tale of woe to tell :

It is an orphan babe that's presste
In anguishe to a widowed breaste;
On Cressie's playne his father fell-
Then aske not, gentle stranger, why
Thus forlorne I sit and sigh.

Nathless comfort take, fayre Ladye,
And let thy griefe assuaged bee;