I. 1.

As when a feast's free-hearted lord
Lifts high the wassail cup,
Around whose lip the vine-dew poured
Runs freshly sparkling up,-
And pledging, on his homeward way
From house to house the bridegroom
gay,

To him presents it-golden all,
His treasures' chiefest coronal,
Grace of the board and banquet hall ;
And honouring thus the league then
knit,

In sight of them, that round him sit, Exalts that envied youth, whose head shall rest,

In happiness and joy, upon his truelove's maiden breast.

II. 2.

So, to the wreath-crowned MEN I lift
The nectar-flowing bowl,
Chalice of song, the Muses' gift,
Sweet fruitage of the soul;
Their hearts to cheer the prize that
gain

On Pythian and Olympian plain.
And happy he, in life and death,
Whose name the ever-living breath
Of dulcet praise encompasseth.
For to and fro doth glance the eye
Of life-enlightening poesy,
With frequent chime of mellow-mur-
muring shell,

Blent with the burst of full-voiced flutes,

That loud their descant swell.

III. 3. Yes-pipe and lute ring gaily, while The sunny waves I pass,That gird fair Rhodes, his fathers' isle

With bold Diagoras; Hymning the child of Aphrodite,

The Sun-god's Ocean-bride,
And him, the chief of giant height,
Who plucked with foremost hand in
fight,

Proud guerdon of his manhood's might,
The wreath upon Alpheus' side.
Him will I sing, for conqueror he
Beside the fount of Castaly,
And of good Damagetus tell,
His sire, beloved by Justice well;
For on a noble isle they dwell,

With many an Argive spear; Where, capped with tower and citadel, Their heads three cities rear, Fast by the beak that juts, unrent, From Asia's boundless continent.

IV. 1.

Fain would I build the song for them,
Sons of the strong Eraclean stem,
A common lay to all that spring
From old Tlepolemus the king.
Nor empty is, methinks, their pride-
For downwards, on the father's side,
From Jove their lineage runs ;
While, by the mother traced, their

name

From fair Astydameia came,

Amyntor's true born sons.

But round the o'erclouded minds o. men,

Unnumbered errors lower; And profitless the task to ken What now may best betide, and then, At life's last closing hour.

V. 2.

For, in the by-gone days of yore,
The planter of this pleasant shore,
Tlepolemus, in anger hot,

Alcmena's bastard brother smote,
Licymnius :-him, with hand of blood,
And mace of gnarled olive-wood,

At Tiryns' rocky tower

He smote-and slew him where he stood,

As forth he tripp'd, in heedless mood,
From Medea's matron-bower.
Thus Passion's fitful gusts, when they
Within the bosom swell,

Drag even the wise man's steps astray:
Thence to the God he bent his way,
And sought the oracle.

VI. 3.

His prayer he offered: when to him
The Godhead, golden-tress'd,
Gave answer meet, and from his dim
Sweet-incensed shrine address'd:
"Away! away! from Lerna-bay

Steer thy brave barks, and hold
Thine onward course the waters o'er,
Unto a sea-encircled shore,
Where erst the gods' great emperor,
Rain'd snows, that gleam'd with gold,
And, soft descending, lighted down
In silence o'er a stately town.

"What time, by shrewd Hephaistus' craft,

The curtal-ax of brazen haftSheer through-Jove's topmost temples claft,

And forth Athena sprang,

Full arm'd and long the Goddess laugh'd,

And loud her war-note rang: Whereat shook highest Heaven with dread,

And Earth, the mother, shuddered."

VII. 1.

'Twas then Hyperion's blessed son, Fountain of light and life to man, Bade his loved children, every one,

The coming marvel keenly sean; That they should rear, till then unknown,

Her first far-flaming altar-stone, Whose hallow'd hearth, with offerings strown,

Might win the charmed heart of Jove, And the spear-clashing maiden's love, For with success and joy is fraught Man's reverence of forecasting thought.

VIII. 2.

But oft, unmark'd and heeded not,
Oblivion's cloudy rack
Sweeps on, till from the mind it blot
Stern duty's forward track.
Nor they unto their sire gave heed,
For carrying not the hearth-flame's
seed,

The hill they climb with reckless speed,
And fashion'd, but with fireless rite,
A fane, upon that airy height.

Yet, from the full cloud's amber fold, Jove showered o'er them a flood of gold.

IX. 3.

And she, the Maid of flashing eye, Vouchsafed them art's proud mastery, O'er all on earth, with peerless hand To compass what their thoughts had plann'd.

Hence each broad way with shapes grew rife,

That, starting, seem'd instinct with life;

On them deep glory fell:

But ne'er to its full strength is nurst The wise man's skill by arts accurst,

Or witchery's wizard spell. So list to a tale of the olden time; When Jove, and they of heavenly birth,

Were culling, clime by clime,

The kingdoms of the earth,

Not yet, on the ocean's breast,
Shone Rhodes in the light of day,
But enshrouded and at rest
In the deep-sea-hollows lay.

X. 1.

Yet for the absent Helius, none
Mark'd out the lot-but left,
Of frightful meed and portion reft,
The pure and holy Sun.
Returning, he the wrong proclaimed,
And Jove afresh the lots had framed,
But that the God his wish forbade,
"For in the hoary waves," he said,
"I see an islet sleep :

And now it swells from the Ocean floor,
Mother of men, and ever more
A kindly nurse of sheep!"

XI. 2.

Then, straightway, gave the God command

To Lachesis, that she, The golden-tiar'd Deity,

Outstretch the accordant hand, And slighting not Heaven's awful oath, Plight with old Cronus' son her troth, That the fair isle, from darkness sent, Full in the glorious firmament Should stand, his fief for aye, Thus closed, with glad assurance blest, His crowning word, and on the breast Of Truth alighting lay.

XII. 3.

Then budded the isle from the salt sea spray,

And spread for him her sparkling meads.

Sire of the sunlight's arrowy ray,

Prince of the fierce flame-breathing steeds.

There, in bright Rhodes' embrace reclined,

Seven sons the god begot; Chiefs, wise of heart, of wariest mind, Were few, I ween, of human kind,

Whom they surpassed not. Of these bold brethren, one

To heroes three was sire-
Eulysus, his first-born son,

And Lindus and Camire.
Apart they held, in triple share
Carved out, their father's isle ;
And hence three fenced cities bare
Their lordly founder's style.

XIII. 1.

There, to their loved Tirynthian chief, Tlepolemus-sweet balm of grief, Asto a god-high towers tow'rd heaven,

The pitchy pomp of flamesLord of the lists, to him is given

THERE are certain money-making associations, called Joint-Stock Banks, whose branches overshadow the land. No city, however large, no village, however small, can escape the colonizing assiduity of those wonderful establishments. The "Branch" is transplanted with inconceivable rapidity strikes root in an instant, and bears fruit from the moment it touches the soil. Railways and Joint-Stock Banks will assuredly, between them, turn old Scotland upside down. A railway through Drumshorlan Muir, with a train of fifty carriages, loaded, roof and body, with men and bales of goods, besides women, crockery, and other brittle ware;-a branch of the Great Western Bank, showing forth goodly leaves and blossoms at Inverary; these, and a few other sights of our modern days, would have made Bailie Nicol Jarvie lose conceit of the Saut Market. What invocations he might have made to his "Conscience" it is not for us to say; nor, indeed, can we affirm with certainty, that the honest citizen would have retained conscience enough even to swear by; for who knows but he might have been like the rest of us, and have thrown off that and other heavy luggage, as being an encumbrance to the rapidity of what is called the Progress. The March of Mind is performed best without baggage. But with these great truths we have at present no concern. What we mean to assert, and at the same time to deplore, is, that all these newfangled establishments-Joint-Stock Banks, Railways, and Steam-Boat Companies-will finally succeed in exterminating three very excellent things, Private Bankers, King's Highways, and Leith Smacks. Yes, the whole species of private banks will be destroyed; if, perchance, a specimen is preserved in the British Museum, he will be gazed on as we now look upon the Dodo,-by many treated as a fabulous bird altogether, by the generality believed to be a freak of Nature-a solitary instance, and not the representative of a widely-diffused species. Whoever, in travelling through a country town, saw a well-fed individual, about fifty years of age, standing

at the door of a large comfortablelooking house-his blue coat resplendent with bright brass buttons-his drab-coloured kerseymere shorts concluded by long gaiters of the same, with about three inches of snow-white stocking visible at the junction-a low range of building at one side of the mansion, pierced by one dingy window and one door of very massive appearance, with the words " Bank open from 10 till 3," in time-worn letters, above the lintel;-whoever has seen all this may congratulate himself that he has seen a sight which his posterity will look for in vain. That was the Private Banker.-But whoso travelling, whether through town or village, beholds a very elegant young man kissing his hand to the landlady's daughter, who is watching him from an upstairs window, as he steps into his gig, which the ostler has brought round to the door of the "Branch of the Joint-Stock Bank," and observes the jaunty air with which he handles the ribbons, the exquisite fit of his coat, and the gallant air with which his well-brushed hat is stuck on one side of his head ;-let the person who sees all this ponder well on the mutability of human affairs, for this is the District Manager, before whose star our fat friend in the kerseymere smalls "begins to pale his ineffectual fire." What the ultimate end of all these things will be is not our business; nor is it our intention to indulge in a treatise on the principles of banking, leaving that to our ingenious friend Mr Bell, whose Letter on the subject is admirably clear and convincing; nor do we intend to be didactic about monetary systems, or paper currencies, or average deposits, it being our uniform practice to deposit the whole of our worldly goods in our breechespocket, convinced, from long and melancholy experience, that every man is his own best banker;-but our object at this present writing is to give a faithful account of sundry adventures which befell the members of a banking family in the of Scotland, which (as Mathews used to have it) created a great sensation at the time.

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