And in my dreams, methought, I went I stoop'd, methought, the dove to take. And thence I vow'd this selfsame day, Thus Bracy said: the baron, the while, His eyes made up of wonder and love; A snake's small eye blinks dull and shy, And with somewhat of malice and more of dread, 'At Christabel she look'd askance :- The maid, alas! her thoughts are gone, That look, those shrunken serpent eyes, That all her features were resign'd To this sole image in her mind: That look of dull and treacherous hate! And when the trance was o'er, the maid Then falling at the baron's feet, Why is thy cheek so wan and wild, Sir Leoline! And wouldst thou wrong thy only child, Her child and thine? Within the baron's heart and brain To the insulted daughter of his friend THE CONCLUSION TO PART II. A fairy thing with red round cheeks Must needs express his love's excess (O sorrow and shame should this be true!) YOUTH AND AGE. VERSE, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying, Naught cared this body for wind or weather, Flowers are lovely; love is flower-like; Ere I was old! Ere I was old? Ah woful Ere, THE DEVIL'S THOUGHTS. FROM his brimstone bed at break of day A-walking the DEVIL is gone, To visit his little snug farm of the earth, And see how his stock went on. 72 Over the hill and over the dale And how then was the Devil drest? O! he was in his Sunday's best: His jacket was red and his breeches were blue, And there was a hole where the tail came through. He saw a LAWYER killing a viper On a dung-heap beside his stable, And the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind Of Cain and his brother, Abel. A POTHECARY on a white horse Rode by on his vocations, And the Devil thought of his old friend DEATH in the Revelations. He saw a cottage with a double coach-house, And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin He went into a rich bookseller's shop, Quoth he! we are both of one college; For I myself sate like a cormorant once, Fast by the tree of knowledge.* Down the river there plied with wind and tide, A pig, with vast celerity; And all amid them stood the Tree of Life Of vegetable gold (query paper money?); and next to Our Death, the Tree of Knowledge, grew fast by. So clomb this first grand thief Thence up he flew, and on the tree of life The allegory here is so apt, that in a catalogue of va rious readings obtained from collating the MSS. one might expect to find it noted, that for "Life" Cod. quid habent, "Trade." Though indeed the trade, i. e. the bibliopolic, so called, kàr' ε6xny, may be regarded as life sansu eminentiori: a suggestion, which I owe to a young retailer in the hosiery line, who on hearing a description of the net profits, dinner parties, country houses, etc. of the trade, exclaimed, "Ay! that's what I call life now!" -This "Life, our Death," is thus happily contrasted with the fits of authorship.-Sic nos non nobis mellificamus Apcs. Of this poem, with which the Fire, Famine, and Slaughter first appeared in the Morning Post, the three first stanzas, which are worth all the rest, and the ninth, were dictated by Mr. Southey. Between the ninth and the concluding stanza, two or three are omitted as grounded on subjects that have lost their interest-and for better II. "Ah," replied my gentle fair; "Dear one, what are names but air?- SLY Beelzebub took all occasions But Heaven, that brings out good from evil, His servants, horses, oxen, cows- HOARSE Mævius reads his hobbling verse And finds them both divinely smooth, But folks say Mævius is no ass; THERE comes from old Avaro's grave A deadly stench-why, sure, they have Immured his soul within his grave! SWANS sing before they die-'twere no bad thing Did certain persons die before they sing. THE GARDEN OF BOCCACCIO. Of late, in one of those most weary hours, A dreary mood, which he who ne'er has known I sate and cower'd o'er my own vacancy! I but half saw that quiet hand of thine The love, the joyance, and the gallantry! But casts in happier moulds the slumberer's Gazed by an idle eye with silent might In selfless boyhood, on a new world tost Or fateful hymn of those prophetic maids, And, like a gift from heaven, in lifeful glee, Fair cities, gallant mansions, castles old, Prattled and play'd with bird, and flower, and stone, See! Boccace sits, unfolding on his knees As with elfin playfellows well known, Thanks, gentle artist! now I can descry Sit on the ground-sward, and the banquet share. With old Boccaccio's soul I stand possest, The brightness of the world, O thou once free, The new-found roll of old Mæonides;* Still in thy garden let me watch their pranks, *Boccaccio claimed for himself the glory of having first introduced the works of Homer to his country. + I know few more striking or more interesting proofs of the overwhelming influence which the study of the Greek and Roman classics exercised on the judgments, feelings, and imaginations of the literati of Europe at the commencement of the restoration of literature, than the passage in the Filocopo of Boccaccio: where the sage in structer, Racheo, as soon as the young prince and the beautiful girl, Biancafiore had learned their letters, sets them to study the Holy Book, Ovid's Art of Love. "Incominciò Racheo a mettere il suo officio in essecuzione con intera sollecitudine. E loro, in breve tempo, inseg nato a conoscer le lettere, fece legere il santo libro d' Ovvidio, nel quale il sommo poeta mostra, come i santi fuochi di Venere si debbano ne freddi cuori occendere." JAMES MONTGOMERY. JAMES MONTGOMERY was born in Irvine, Ayrshire, in 1771. His parents belonged to the church of the United Brethren, commonly called Moravians, a sect by no means numerous in England, and still more limited in Scotland. Having previously sojourned for a short time at a village in the Irish county of Antrim, they placed the future poet at the school of their society at Fulnick, near Leeds, and embarked for the West Indies as missionaries among the negro slaves. They were the victims of their zeal and humanity; the husband died in Barbadoes, and the wife in Tobago. by the upright and unimpeachable tenor of his lifeeven more than by his writings-the persuasive and convincing advocate of religion. In his personal appearance, Montgomery is rather below than above the middle stature: his countenance is peculiarly bland and tranquil; and but for the occasional sparklings of a clear gray eye, it could scarcely be described as expressive. Very early in life, Montgomery published a volume of poems. They were not, it would appear, favourably received by the public; and he writes, the disappointment of his premature poetical hopes brought with it a blight which his mind has never recovered. "For many years," he adds, "I was as mute as a moulting bird; and when the power of song returned, it was without the energy, selfconfidence, and freedom which happier minstrels among my contemporaries have manifested." The Wanderer of Switzerland was published in 1806; the West Indies, in 1810; the World before the Flood, in 1813; Greenland in 1819; the Pelican Island, in 1827: he has since contented himself with the production of occasional verses. Those who can distinguish the fine gold from the 'sounding brass" of poetry, must place the name of James Montgomery high in the list of British After remaining two years at Fulnick, and, like other men of genius, disappointing the expectations of his friends as a student, "from very indolence," he was placed by them in a retail shop at Mirfield near Wakefield. This ungenial employment he considered himself-not being under indenturesat liberty to relinquish at the end of two years, with a view to try his fortune in the great world. After spending other two years at a village near Rotherham, and a few months with a bookseller in London, he engaged as an assistant with Mr. Joseph Gales of Sheffield, who, published a newspaper; to the management of which, in 1794, he succeeded. This, though conducted with comparative moderation, exposed him to much enmity-poets; and those who consider that the chiefest rather inherited from his predecessor than actually incurred by himself. The liberty of the press in those days was, like faith," the substance of things hoped for;" a sentence of condemnation, or even a word of reproach, against men in "high places," was punished as libellous. Montgomery did not indeed share the fate of some of his stern sectarian forefathers; but in lieu of maiming and pillory, he had to endure fine and imprisonment. Within eighteen months, and when he had scarcely arrived at manhood, his exertions in the cause of rational freedom had twice consigned him to a jail. During the thirty years that followed, however, he was permitted to publish his opinions, without being the object of open persecutions. Wearied out, at length, he relinquished his newspaper, in 1825. Recently one of the government grants to British worthies has been conferred upon him; and--it must be recorded to his honour-by Sir Robert Peel. The poet continues to reside in Sheffield,esteemed, admired, and beloved: a man of purer mind, or more unsuspected integrity, never existed. He is an honour to the profession of letters; and duty of such is to promote the cause of religion, virtue, and humanity, must acknowledge in him one of their most zealous and efficient advocates. He does not, indeed, often aim at bolder flights of imagination; but if he seldom rises above, he never sinks beneath, the object of which he desires the attainment. If he rarely startles us, he still more rarely leaves us dissatisfied; he does not attempt that to which his powers are unequal, and therefore is at all times successful. To the general reader, it will seem as if the early bias of his mind and his first associations had tinged-we may not say tainted-the source from whence he drew his inspirations, and that his poems are "sicklied o'er" with peculiar impressions and opinions which fail to excite the sympathy of the great mass of mankind. We should, however, recollect, that, although he has chiefly addressed himself to those who think with him, his popularity is by no means confined to them; but that those who read poetry for the delight it affords them, and without any reference to his leading design, acknowledge his merit, and contribute to his fame. 572 |