Beneath my father's roof and care,—

Of every other friend bereft :
An heiress, with her fertile vales,
Caskets of Indian gold and pearl;
Yet meek as poverty itself,

And timid as a peasant girl:
A delicate, frail thing, but made

For spring sunshine, or summer shade;—
A slender flower, unmeet to bear
One April shower,—so slight, so fair.

I loved her as a brother loves

His favourite sister:-and when war
First call'd me from our long-shared home
To bear my father's sword afar,
I parted from her,—not as one

Whose life and soul are wrung by parting: With death-cold brow and throbbing pulse,

And burning tears like lifeblood starting. Lost in war dreams, I scarcely heard

The prayer that bore my name above:
The "Farewell!" that kiss'd off her tears,
Had more of pity than of love!

I thought of her not with that deep,
Intensest memory love will keep
More tenderly than life. To me

She was but as a dream of home,-
One of those calm and pleasant thoughts
That o'er the soldier's spirit come;
Remembering him, when battle lowrs,
Of twilight walks and fireside hours.

I came to thy bright FLORENCE when
The task of blood was done :
I saw thee! Had I lived before?
O, no! my life but then begun.
Ay, by that blush! the summer rose
Has not more luxury of light!
Ay, by those eyes! whose language is

Like what the clear stars speak at night,
Thy first look was a fever spell!—
Thy first word was an oracle

Which seal'd my fate! I worshipp'd thee,
My beautiful, bright deity!
Worshipp'd thee as a sacred thing
Of Genius' high imagining;
But loved thee for thy sweet revealing
Of woman's own most gentle feeling.
I might have broken from the chain

Thy power, thy glory round me flung!
But never might forget thy blush-

The smile which on thy sweet lips hung!
I lived but in thy sight! One night
From thy hair fell a myrtle blossom;
It was a relic that breathed of thee:
Look! it has wither'd in my bosom!

Yet I was wretched, though I dwelt
In the sweet sight of Paradise:

Thus smiled upon by those dear eyes, Will I think over thoughts of pain.

I'll only tell thee that the line That ever told Love's misery,

Ne'er told of misery like mine! I wedded. I could not have borne To see the young IANTHE blighted By that worst blight the spring can knowTrusting affection ill requited!

O, was it that she was too fair,

Too innocent for this damp earth; And that her native star above

Reclaim'd again its gentle birth? She faded. O, my peerless queen,

I need not pray thee pardon me For owning that my heart then felt For any other than for thee!

I bore her to those azure isles

Where health dwells by the side of spring; And deem'd their green and sunny vales,

And calm and fragrant airs, might bring
Warmth to the cheek, light to the eye,
Of her who was too young to die.
It was in vain!-and, day by day
The gentle creature died away.
As parts the odour from the rose-
As fades the sky at twilight's close-
She past so tender and so fair;

So patient, though she knew each breath
Might be her last; her own mild smile

Parted her placid lips in death.
Her grave is under southern skies;
Green turf and flowers o'er it rise.
O! nothing but a pale spring wreath
Would fade o'er her who lies beneath!
I gave her prayers-I gave her tears-
I staid awhile beside her grave;
Then led by Hope, and led by Love,
Again I cut the azure wave.
What have I more to say, my life!

But just to pray one smile of thine,
Telling I have not loved in vain-

That thou dost join these hopes of mine? Yes, smile, sweet love! our life will be As radiant as a fairy tale ! Glad as the sky-lark's earliest songSweet as the sigh of the spring gale! All, all that life will ever be, Shone o'er, divinest love! by thee..

O, mockery of happiness

Love now was all too late to save. False Love! O what had you to do With one you had led to the grave! A little time I had been glad To mark the paleness on my cheek;

To feel how, day by day, my step
Grew fainter, and my hand more weak
To know the fever of my soul

Was also preying on my frame:
But now I would have given worlds

To change the crimson hectic's flame
For the pure rose of health; to live
For the dear life that Love could give.
-O, youth may sicken at its bloom,
And wealth and fame pray for the tomb ;-
But can love bear from love to part,
And not cling to that one dear heart?
I shrank away from death,-my tears
Had been unwept in other years :—
But thus, in love's first ecstasy.
Was it not worse than death to die?
LORENZO! I would live for thee!
But thou wilt have to weep for me!
That sun has kiss'd the morning dews,—
I shall not see its twilight close!
That rose is fading in the noon,

And I shall not outlive that rose!
Come, let me lean upon thy breast,
My last, best place of happiest rest!
Once more let me breathe thy sighs-
Look once more in those watching eyes!
O! but for thee, and grief of thine,
And parting, I should not repine!
It is deep happiness to die,
Yet live in Love's dear memory.
Thou wilt remember me,-my name
Is link'd with beauty and with fame.
The summer airs, the summer sky,
The soothing spell of Music's sigh,-
Stars in their poetry of night,
The silver silence of moonlight,-
The dim blush of the twilight hours,
The fragrance of the bee-kiss'd flowers :-
But, more than all, sweet songs will be
Thrice sacred unto Love and me.
LORENZO! be this kiss a spell!
My first!—my last! FAREWELL!-FAREWELL!

THERE is a lone and stately hall, Its master dwells apart from all.

:

A wanderer through Italia's land,

One night a refuge there I found. The lightning flash roll'd o'er the sky,

The torrent rain was sweeping round: These won me entrance. He was young,

The castle's lord, but pale like age; His brow, as sculpture beautiful,

Was wan as Grief's corroded page, He had no words, he had no smiles, No hopes-his sole employ to brood Silently over his sick heart

In sorrow and in solitude.

I saw the hall where, day by day,
He mused his weary life away;
It scarcely seem'd a place for wo,

But rather like a genie's home.
Around were graceful statues ranged,

And pictures shone around the dome. But there was one-a loveliest one!

One picture brightest of all there! O! never did the painter's dream

Shape thing so gloriously fair! It was a face!-the summer day

Is not more radiant in its light! Dark flashing eyes, like the deep stars Lighting the azure brow of night; A blush like sunrise o'er the rose;

A cloud of raven hair, whose shade Was sweet as evening's, and whose curls Cluster'd beneath a laurel braid. She leant upon a harp :-one hand

Wander'd, like snow, amid the chords; The lips were opening with such life,

You almost heard the silvery words. She look'd a form of light and life,

All soul, all passion, and all fire; A priestess of Apollo's, when

The morning beams fall on her lyre; A Sappho, or ere love had turn'd The heart to stone where once it burn'd. But by the picture's side was placed A funeral urn, on which was traced The heart's recorded wretchedness;— And on a tablet, hung above, Was 'graved one tribute of sad words

"LORENZO TO HIS MINSTREL LOVE."

ROSALIE.

"TIs a wild tale-and sad, too, as the sigh

That young lips breathe when Love's first dreamings fly;

Music swept past :-it was a simple tone;
But it has waken'd heartfelt sympathies ;—
It has brought into life things past and gone;
Has waken'd all those secret memories,
That may be smother'd, but that still will be

showers,

The notes had roused an answering chord within:

flowers.

Love! gentlest spirit! I do tell of thee,

Of all thy thousand hopes, thy many fears, Thy morning blushes, and thy evening tears; What thou hast ever been, and still will be,Life's best, but most betraying witchery!

It is a night of summer,-and the sea Sleeps, like a child, in mute tranquillity. Soft o'er the deep-blue wave the moonlight breaks; Gleaming, from out the white clouds of its zone, Like beauty's changeful smile, when that it seeks Some face it loves, yet fears to dwell upon. The waves are motionless, save where the oar, Light as Love's anger, and as quickly gone, Has broken in upon their azure sleep.

Odours are on the air :-the gale has been Wandering in groves where the rich roses weep,— Where orange, citron, and the soft lime-flowers Shed forth their fragrance to night's dewy hours. Afar the distant city meets the gaze,

Where tower and turret in the pale light shine, Seen like the monuments of other daysMonuments Time half shadows, half displays. And there are many, who, with witching song And wild guitar's soul-thrilling melody, Or the lute's melting music, float along

O'er the blue waters, still and silently. That night had Naples sent her best display Of young and gallant, beautiful and gay.

l'here was a bark a little way apart

From all the rest, and there two lovers leant:One with a blushing cheek and beating heart, And bashful glance, upon the sea-wave bent; She might not meet the gaze the other sent Upon her beauty ;-but the half-breathed sighs The deepening colour, timid smiling eyes, Told that she listen'd Love's sweet flatteries. Then they were silent-words are little aid To love, whose deepest vows are ever made By the heart's beat alone. O, silence is Love's own peculiar eloquence of bliss!—

been.

Her alter'd look is pale:-that dewy eye

Almost belies the smile her rich lips wear;That smile is mock'd by a scarce-breathing sigh, Which tells of silent and suppress'd careTells that the life is withering with despair, More irksome from its unsunned silentness

A festering wound the spirit pines to bear; A galling chain, whose pressure will intrude, Fettering Mirth's step, and Pleasure's lightes mood.

Where are her thoughts thus wandering ?-A spot,

Now distant far, is pictured on her mind,― A chestnut shadowing a low white cot,

With rose and jasmine round the casement twined,

Mix'd with the myrtle-tree's luxuriant blind. Alone, (O! should such solitude be here ?)

An aged form beneath the shade reclined, Whose eye glanced round the scene ;-and then

a tear

Told that she miss'd one in her heart enshrined!

Then came remembrances of other times,

When eve oped her rich bowers for the pale

day;

When the faint, distant tones of convent chimes

Were answer'd by the lute and vesper lay ;— When the fond mother blest her gentle child, And for her welfare pray'd the Virgin mild.

And she has left the aged one to steep

Her nightly couch with tears for that lost child,

The ROSALIE,-who left her age to weep,

When that the tempter flatter'd her and wiled Her steps away, from her own home beguiled. She started up in agony :-her eye

Met MANFREDI's. Softly he spoke, and smiled Memory is past, and thought and feeling lie Lost in one dream-all thrown on one wild die.

That mother's arms might fold her child again,
The cold world scorn, the cruel smite in vain,
And falsehood be remember'd no more,
In that calm shelter :-and she might weep o'er
Her faults and find forgiveness. Had not she

To whom she knelt found pardon in the eyes
Of Heaven, in offering for sacrifice
A broken heart? And might not pardon be
Also for her? She look'd up to the face

Of that pale saint; and in that gentle brow, Which seem'd to hold communion with her thought,

There was a smile which gave hope energy. She pray'd one deep, wild prayer,—that she might gain

But how felt RoSALIE?-The very air

Seem'd as it brought reproach! there was no

eye

To look delighted, welcome none was there!
She felt as feels an outcast wandering by
Where every door is closed! She look'd around!-
She heard some voices' sweet familiar sound.
There were some changed, and some remember'd
things;

There were girls, whom she left in their first springs,

Now blush'd into full beauty. There was one
Whom she loved tenderly in days now gone!
She was not dancing gayly with the rest ;
A rose-cheek'd child within her arms was prest;

again.

A flush of beauty is upon the skyEve's last warm blushes-like the crimson dye The maiden wears, when first her dark eyes

meet

The graceful lover's sighing at her feet.

And there were sounds of music on the breeze,
And perfume shaken from the citron trees;
While the dark chestnuts caught a golden ray
On their green leaves, the last bright gift of day;
And peasants dancing gayly in the shade

To the soft mandolin, whose light notes made
An echo fit to the glad voices singing.
The twilight spirit his sweet urn is flinging
Of dew upon the lime and orange stems,
And giving to the rose pearl diadems.

There is a pilgrim by that old gray tree, With head upon her hand bent mournfully; And looking round upon each lovely thing, And breathing the sweet air, as they could bring To her no beauty and no solacing.

"Tis ROSALIE! Her prayer was not in vain, The truant-child has sought her home again!

It must be worth a life of toil and care,Worth those dark chains the wearied one must

bear

Who toils up fortune's steep,-all that can wring
The worn-out bosom with lone suffering,-
Worth restlessness, oppression, goading fears,
And long-deferr'd hopes of many years,—
To reach again that little quiet spot,

So well loved once, and never quite forgot ;-
To trace again the steps of infancy,
And catch their freshness from their memory!
And it is triumph, sure, when fortune's sun
Ilas shone upon us, and our task is done,
To show our harvest to the eyes which were
Once all the world to us! Perhaps there are
Some who had presaged kindly of our youth;
Feel we not proud their prophecy was sooth?

That cluster'd o'er its mother's brow: as fair
As buds in spring. She gave her laughing dove
To one who clasp'd it with a father's love;
And if a painter's eye had sought a scene
Of love in its most perfect loveliness-
Of childhood, and of wedded happiness,—
He would have painted the sweet MADELINE!
But ROSALIE shrank from them, and she stray'd
Through a small grove of cypresses, whose shade
Hung o'er a burying-ground, where the low stone
And the gray cross recorded those now gone!
There was a grave just closed. Not one seem'd

near,

To pay the tribute of one long-last tear!
How very desolate must that one be
Whose more than grave has not a memory!

Then ROSALIE thought on her mother's age,-
Just such her end would be with her away:
No child the last cold death-pang to assuage-
No child by her neglected tomb to pray!
She ask'd-and like a hope from heaven it
came !-

To hear them answer with a stranger's name.

She reach'd her mother's cottage; by that gate She thought how her once lover wont to wait To tell her honey'd tales; and then she thought On all the utter ruin he had wrought! The moon shone brightly, as it used to do Ere youth, and hope, and love, had been untrue; But it shone o'er the desolate! The flowers Were dead; the faded jessamine, unbound, Trail'd, like a heavy weed, upon the ground; And fell the moonlight vainly over trees, Which had not even one rose,-although the

breeze,

Almost as if in mockery, had brought
Sweet tones it from the nightingale had caught!

She enter'd in the cottage. None were there! The hearth was dark,-the walls look'd cold and bare!