TO THE RAINBOW.

BY T. CAMPBELL.

Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky
When storms prepare to part,
I ask not proud philosophy

To teach me what thou art—

Still seem as to my childhood's sight

A midway station given For happy spirits to alight

Betwixt the earth and heaven.

Can all that optics teach, unfold
Thy form to please me so,
As when I dreamt of gems and gold
Hid in thy radiant bow?

When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws.

And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.

When o'er the green undeluged earth

Heaven's covenant thou didst shine, How came the world's grey fathers forth To watch thy sacred sign.

And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod,
Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.
Methinks, thy jubilee to keep,
The first-made anthem rang,
On earth deliver'd from the deep,
And the first poet sang.

Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam :
Theme of primeval prophecy,

Be still the poet's theme.

The earth to thee its incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When glittering in the freshen'd fields
The snowy mushroom springs.
How glorious is thy girdle cast
O'er mountain, tower, and town,
Or mirror'd in the ocean vast
A thousand fathoms down.
As fresh in yon horizon dark,
As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark
First sported in thy beam.

For faithful to its sacred page,

Heaven still rebuilds thy span,
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.

THE LOVER TO HIS MISTRESS ON HER BIRTH-DAY; A SONG TRANSLATED FROM THE BOHEMIAN.

BY T. CAMPBELL.

IF any white-wing'd Power above

My joys and griefs survey,

The day when thou wert born, my love-
He surely bless'd that day.

I laugh'd (till taught by thee) when told
Of Beauty's magic powers,

That ripen'd life's dull ore to gold,
And changed its weeds to flowers.

My mind had lovely shapes pourtray'd;
But thought I earth had one
Could make ev'n Fancy's visions fade
Like stars before the sun?

I gazed, and felt upon my lips

Th' unfinish'd accents hang:

One moment's bliss, one burning kiss,
To rapture chang'd each pang.

And though as swift as lightning's flash
Those tranced moments flew,

Not all the waves of time shall wash
Their memory from my view.

But duly shall my raptured song,
And gladly shall my eyes,
Still bless this day's return, as long

As thou shalt see it rise.

TO A CHILD.

BY JOANNA BAILLIE.

Whose imp art thou, with dimpled cheek,
And curly pate and merry eye,

And arm and shoulders round and sleek
And soft and fair? thou urchin sly!

What boots it who with sweet caresses
First call'd thee his, or squire or hind?
For thou in every wight that passes
Dost now a friendly play-mate find.

Thy downcast glances, grave but cunning,

As fringed eye-lids rise and fall,

Thy shyness, swiftly from me running,— "Tis infantine coquetry all!

But far a-field thou hast not flown,

With mocks and threats half-lisp'd half-spoken, I feel thee pulling at my gown,

Of right goodwill thy simple token.

And thou must laugh and wrestle too,
A mimick warfare with me waging,

To make, as wily lovers do,
Thy after-kindness more engaging.

The wilding rose, sweet as thyself,
And new-cropt daisies, are thy treasure:
I'd gladly part with worldly pelf
To taste again thy youthful pleasure.

But yet for all thy merry look,

Thy frisks and wiles, the time is coming,
When thou shalt sit in cheerless nook,
The weary spell or horn-book thumbing.
Well; let it be! through weal and woe
Thou know'st not now thy future range;
Life is a motley shifting show,

And thou a thing of hope and change.

A JOURNEY TO PALMYRA, OR TADMOR IN THE DESERT, SHORT ENQUIRY RELATIVE TO THE WIND

WITH A

THE DESERT CALLED SAMIELI.

BY COUNT WENCESLAUS RZEWUSKY.

OF

PALMYRA, or Tadmor, situated in the arid and burning Desert of Arabia (the province of Hauran), is too interesting not to excite the curiosity of every traveller who loves to carry back his imagination to the remotest periods of antiquity, and to contemplate, among majestic ruins, the vicissitudes of fortune. Once splendid, and celebrated for its luxury and its commerce, interesting from the misfortunes of the warlike and proud Zenobia, Palmyra, whose temple rivalled in riches the most magnificent edifices, the number of whose columns seemed to equal that of the stars, is now only a heap of overthrown columns, of insulated colonnades, of broken capitals, and decayed porticoes. Koehla and Ada, two mountains at the foot of which Palmyra is situated, and which the Bedouins often celebrate in their poetry, no more re-echo to the cheerful songs of an industrious and prosperous people. Gloomy Silence, the presiding genius of the waste, has succeeded to the hymns and songs of joy; and the Arab alone, armed with his lance, and mounted on his spirited mare, sometimes animates this solitude. There leaning on the tombs which cover the heights, he meditates the commission of some crime; he watches the favourable moment; or endeavours to surprise the ostrich for the sake of its feathers. The statues which adorned the temples and the galleries, are buried under deep sand, which the winds have been amassing for centuries. The sanctuary of the Sun has become a wretched hamlet, and its fine remains serve as vaults, or as walls to the miserable sheds which some poor inhabitants have fixed to them, and who daily abandon them, never to return. It is in the midst of these ruins that the eye of the philosopher is struck with the unequal combat between Time and Industry. It is on these precious remains that History and Tradition found their triumph; before them, Time is compelled to humble his

destroying scythe. It is through them that a single fragment rebuilds an entire space, that a single name re-animates whole nations. Time thus yields his sceptre to Memory, and Antiquity receives the homage which is its due.

There are travellers who prefer Balbec to Palmyra; but I am not of this opinion. Situated in the rich and fruitful valley of the Bequaa, enclosed in a more confined space, circumscribed within narrower limits, Balbec offers ruins, the ensemble of which is more easily embraced. Palmyra engages both the mind and the heart: they dwell, by turns, on the immensity of these ruins ; on the romantic history of a warlike and unfortunate princess; on periods of glory and humiliation; on the mysteries of an ancient and natural religion. Balbec was the work of the Romans only. Sacred history, its own, with which we are unhappily too little acquainted, and that also of the Romans, are connected with Palmyra. At Balbec, all is great; at Palmyra, all is immense. A valley sufficed for Balbec; the Desert, that solid ocean, was reserved for Palmyra.

It was on the 17th of June 1819, that I set out from Aleppo by the Desert to visit Tadmor. This route, according to the accounts of the people of Aleppo, has not been taken by any one except Scheik Ibrahim (Mr. Burckhardt). I incurred great

dangers during the twenty-three days that I remained in the Desert, in the hands of Quazé guides. I bore the name of the Emir Tage ol Fakhr (crown of glory), the translation of my Polish Christian name, Wiencryslau. I owed this danger to the great celebrity which I had acquired among the Bedouins, on the various occasions when I visited them. I was considered by them as the great Emir of the Bedouin tribes of the North. My hardy and active mode of life, my manner of riding on horseback, the management. of the lance and the sabre, which exercises are familiar to all true Poles from their childhood ; some acts of generosity, a great knowledge of the races of horses of the Nedjed, and of their distinguishing characteristics, proved by examinations which I was obliged to undergo among the tribes of Hosueh, of Weled-Aly, of Sebah, and of the Fidanes-every thing, in short, caused me to be compared with the favourite hero of the Arabs, the celebrated Antar. Verses were sung in my praise among the tribes, and thus my name was spread in the Desert; and, as I afterwards learnt, it penetrated to the remotest part of Arabia. At the time when I determined to leave Aleppo, the Desert was in combustion. The tribe of Weled Aly had just cut to pieces a body of Delibaches of the Pacha of Damascus. The Wechabites had begun again to act offensively; many Sheiks had been arrested and detained by the Pacha of Bagdad, and their tribes roamed about without guides. My appearance in the Desert put all these tribes in motion to