PROMETHEUS.

How awful is that hour, when conscience stings
The hoary wretch, who on his death-bed hears,
Deep in his soul, the thundering voice that rings,
In one dark, damning moment, crimes of years,
And screaming like a vulture in his ears,

Tells one by one his thoughts and deeds of shame;
How wild the fury of his soul careers!

His swart eye flashes with intensest flame,

And like the torture's rack the wrestling of his frame.

185

186

PROMETHEUS.

Our souls have wings; their flight is like the rush
Of whirlwinds, and they upward point their way,
Like him who bears the thunder, when the flush
Of his keen eye feeds on the dazzling ray:
He claps his pinions in the blaze of day,
And gaining on the loftiest arch his throne,

Darts his quick vision on his fated prey,
And, gathering all his vigour, he is gone,
And in an instant grasps his victim as his own.

We soar as proudly, and as quickly fall,

This moment in the empyrean, then we sink,

And wrapping in the joys of sense our all,

The stream that flows from Heaven we cannot drink,
But we will lie along the flowery brink

Of pleasure's tempting current, till the wave
Is bitter and its banks bare, then we think

Of what we might have been, and, idly brave,

We take a short weak flight, and drop into the grave.

SONG.

BY GEORGE P. MORRIS.

WHEN other friends are round thee,
And other hearts are thine;

When other bays have crowned thee,
More fresh and green than mine.
Then think how sad and lonely
This wretched heart will be;
Which, while it beats-beats only,
Beloved one! for thee.

Yet do not think I doubt thee;

I know thy truth remains,
I would not live without thee

For all the world contains.
Thou art the star that guides me
Along life's troubled sea,

And whatever fate betides me,

This heart still turns to thee.

BY AMELIA B. WELBY.

WHEN shines the star, by thee loved best,

Upon these soft delicious eves,

Lighting the ring-dove to her nest,

Where trembling stir the darkling leaves;
When flings the wave its crest of foam
Above the shadowy-mantled seas,

A softness o'er my heart doth come,
Linking thy memory with these;

TO THE MEMORY OF A FRIEND.

For if, amid those orbs that roll,

Thou hast at times a thought of me, For every one that stirs thy soul

A thousand stir my own of thee.

Even now thy dear remembered eyes,
Filled up with floods of radiant light,
Seem bending from the twilight skies,
Outshining all the stars of night:

And thy young face divinely fair,

Like a bright cloud, seems melting through, While low sweet whispers fill the air,

Making my own lips whisper too;

For never does the soft south wind
Steal o'er the hushed and lonely sea,
But it awakens in my mind

A thousand memories of thee.

Oh! could I, while these hours of dreams
Are gathering o'er the silent hills,
While every breeze a minstrel seems
And every leaf a heart that thrills,

Steal all unseen to some hushed place,
And, kneeling 'neath those burning orbs,

For ever gaze on thy sweet face

Till seeing every sense absorbs,

189