TO AN UNFORTUNATE WOMAN,

WHOM THE AUTHOR HAD KNOWN IN THE DAYS OF
HER INNOCENCE.

Myrtle-leaf that, ill besped,
Pinest in the gladsome ray,
Soil'd beneath the common tread,
Far from thy protecting spray!

When the Partridge o'er the sheaf
Whirr'd along the yellow vale,
Sad I saw thee, heedless leaf!
Love the dalliance of the gale.

Lightly didst thou, foolish thing!
Heave and flutter to his sighs,
While the flatterer, on his wing,
Wooed and whisper'd thee to rise.

Gaily from thy mother-stalk

Wert thou danced and wafted high

Soon on this unshelter'd walk
Flung to fade, to rot and die.

ΤΟ

AN UNFORTUNATE WOMAN

AT THE THEATRE.

Maiden, that with sullen brow
Sitt'st behind those virgins gay,
Like a scorch'd and mildew'd bough,
Leafless 'mid the blooms of May!

Him who lured thee and forsook,
Oft I watch'd with angry gaze,
Fearful saw his pleading look,
Anxious heard his fervid phrase.

Soft the glances of the youth,
Soft his speech, and soft his sigh;
But no sound like simple truth,
But no true love in his eye.

Loathing thy polluted lot,

Hie thee, Maiden, hie thee hencel

Seek thy weeping Mother's cot,

With a wiser innocence.

Thou hast known deceit and folly,
Thou hast felt that vice is woe:
With a musing melancholy
Inly arm'd, go, Maiden! go.

Mother sage of Self-dominion,
Firm thy steps, O Melancholy!

The strongest plume in wisdom's pinion Is the memory of past folly.

Mute the sky-lark and forlorn,

While she moults the firstling plumes, That had skimm'd the tender corn, Or the bean-field's odorous blooms.

Soon with renovated wing
Shall she dare a loftier flight,
Upward to the day-star spring
And embathe in heavenly light.

LINES COMPOSED IN A CONCERT-ROOM.

Nor cold, nor stern, my soul! yet I detest
These scented Rooms, where, to a gaudy throng,
Heaves the proud Harlot her distended breast,
In intricacies of laborious song.

These feel not Music's genuine power, nor deign
To melt at Nature's passion-warbled plaint;
But when the long-breath'd singer's uptrill'd strain
Bursts in a squall-they gape for wonderment.

Hark! the deep buzz of Vanity and Hate!
Scornful, yet envious, with self-torturing sneer
My lady eyes some maid of humbler state,
While the pert Captain, or the primmer Priest,
Prattles accordant scandal in her ear.

O give me, from this heartless scene releas'd,
To hear our old musician, blind and grey,
(Whom stretching from my nurse's arms I kist,)
His Scottish tunes and warlike marches play,
By moonshine, on the balmy summer-night,
The while I dance amid the tedded hay
With merry maids, whose ringlets toss in light.

Or lies the purple evening on the bay
Of the calm glossy lake, O let me hide
Unheard, unseen, behind the alder-trees

Around whose roots the fisher's boat is tied,

On whose trim seat doth Edmund stretch at ease, And while the lazy boat sways to and fro, Breathes in his flute sad airs, so wild and slow, That his own check is wet with quiet tears.

But O, dear Annel when midnight wind careers, And the gust pelting on the out-house shed Makes the cock shrilly in the rain-storm crow, To hear thee sing some ballad full of woe, Ballad of ship-wreck'd sailor floating dead,

Whom his own true-love buried in the sands! Thee, gentle woman, for thy voice remeasures Whatever tones and melancholy pleasures

The Things of Nature utter; birds or trees Or moan of ocean-gale in weedy caves,

Or where the stiff grass mid the heath-plant waves, Murmur and music thin of sudden breeze.