To accept your loving convoy, knight?
Or doth she fear our woodland sleight,

And joins us on the plain ?"

With stifled tones the knight replied,
And look'd askance on either side,

Nay, let the hunt proceed !
The Lady's message that I bear,
I guess would scantly please your ear,
And less deserves your

heed.

“ You sent betimes. Not yet unbarred

I found the middle door ;Two stirrers only met my eyes,

Fair Alice, and one more.

“I came unlooked for: and, it seemed,

In an unwelcome hour;
And found the daughter of Du Clos

Within the latticed bower.

“ But hush ! the rest may wait. If lost,

No great loss, I divine ;
And idle words will better suit

A fair maid's lips than mine."

“ God's wrath! speak out, man,” Julian cried,

O’ermaster'd by the sudden smart ;And feigning wrath, sharp, blunt, and rude, The knight his subtle shift pursued. “Scowl not at me; command my skill, To lure your hawk back, if you will,

But not a woman's heart.

“Go! (said she) tell him, --slow is sure,

Fair speed his shafts to-day! I follow here a stronger lure,

And chase a gentler prey."
" The game, pardie, was full in sight,
That then did, if I saw aright,

The fair dame's eyes engage ;
For turning, as I took my ways,
I saw them fix'd with steadfast gaze

Full on her wanton page.”

The last word of the traitor knight

It had but entered Julian's ear,From two o'erarching oaks between, With glist'ning helm-like cap is seen,

Borne on in giddy cheer,

A youth, that ill his steed can guide;
Yet with reverted face doth ride,

As answering to a voice, That seems at once to laugh and chide“Not mine, dear mistress,” still he cried,

“ 'Tis this mad filly's choice.”

With sudden bound, beyond the boy,
See! see! that face of hope and joy,

That regal front ! those cheeks aglow!
Thou needed'st but the crescent sheen,
A quiver’d Dian to have been,

Thou lovely child of old Du Clos !

Dark as a dream Lord Julian stood, Swift as a dream, from forth the wood,

Sprang on the plighted Maid!

With fatal aim, and frantic force,
The shaft was hurl'd a lifeless corse,
Fair Alice from her vaulting horse,

Lies bleeding on the glade.

WHERE is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn ?

Where

may
the

grave of that good man be ?-
By the side of a spring, on the breast of Helvellyn,
Under the twigs of a young birch tree!
The oak that in summer was sweet to hear,
And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year,
And whistled and roared in the winter alone,
Is gone,—and the birch in its stead is grown.
The Knight's bones are dust,
And his good sword rust.-
His soul is with the saints, I trust.

EA ARTH! thou mother of numberless children,

the nurse and the mother, Hail ! O Goddess, thrice hail! Blest be thou! and,

blessing, I hymn thee! Forth, ye sweet sounds: from my harp, and my

voice shall float on your surgesSoar thou aloft, O my soul! and bear up my song

on thy pinions. Travelling the vale with mine eyes-green meadows

and lake with green island,

Dark in its bason of rock, and the bare stream flow

ing in brightness, Thrilled with thy beauty and love in the wooded

slope of the mountain, Here, great mother, I lie, thy child, with his head

on thy bosom! Playful the spirits of noon, that rushing soft through

thy tresses, Green-haired goddess ! refresh me; and bark, as

they hurry or linger, Fill the pause of my harp, or sustain it with musi

cal murmurs. Into my being thou murmurest joy, and tenderest

sadness Shedd'st thou, like dew, on my heart, till the joy

and the heavenly sadness Pour themselves forth from my heart in tears, and

the hymn of thanksgiving. Earth! thou mother of numberless children, the

nurse and the mother, Sister thou of the stars, and beloved by the sun, the

rejoicer, Guardian and friend of the moon, O Earth, whom

the comets forget not, Yea, in the measureless distance wheel round, and

again they behold thee! Fadeless and young (and what if the latest birth of

creation ?) Bride and consort of Heaven, that looks down upon

thee enamored! Say, mysterious Earth! O say, great mother and

goddess, Was it not well with thee then, when first thy lap

was ungirdled,

Thy lap to the genial Heaven, the day that he wooed

thee and won thee! Fair was thy blush, the fairest and first of the

blushes of morning! Deep was the shudder, O Earth! the throe of thy

self-retention; Inly thou strovest to flee, and didst seek thyself at

thy centre ! Mightier far was the joy of thy sudden resilience;

and forth with Myriad myriads of lives teemed forth from the

mighty embracement. Thousand-fold tribes of dwellers, impelled by thou

sand-fold instincts, Filled, as a dream, the wide waters; the rivers

sang in their channels ; Laughed on their shores the hoarse seas; the yearn

ing ocean swelled upward ; Young life lowed through the meadows, the woods,

and the echoing mountains, Wandered bleating in valleys, and warbled on blos

soming branches

WRITTEN
DURING A TEMPORARY BLINDNESS

IN THE YEAR 1799.

O WHAT a life is the eye! what a strange and

inscrutable essence ! Him, that is utterly blind, nor glimpses the fire that

warms him; Him that never beheld the swelling breast of his mother;