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His black matted head on his shoulder is bent,

And deep is the sigh of his breath,
And with stedfast dejection his eyes are intent

On the fetters that link him to death.

'Tis sorrow enough on that visage to gaze,

That body dismissed from his care;
But my fancy has pierced to his heart, and pourtrays

More terrible images there.

His bones are consumed, and his life-blood is dried,

With wishes the past to undo; And his crime, through the pains that o'erwhelm him descried,

Still blackens and grows on the view.

When from the dark synod, or blood-reeking field,

To his chamber the monarch is led,
All soothers of sense their soft virtue shall yield,

And quietness pillow his head.

But if grief, self-consumed, in oblivion would doze,

And conscience her tortures appease,
'Mid tumult and uproar this man must repose

In the comfortless vault of disease.

When h& fetters at night have so pressed on his limbs,

That the weight can no longer be borne, If, while a half slumber his memory bedims,'

The wretch on his pallet should turn.

While the gaol mastive.howls at the dull clanking chain,
From the roots of his hair there shall start

A thousand sharp punctures of cold sweating pain,
And terror shall leap at his heart.

But now he half raises his deep-sunken eye.

And the motion unsettles a tear;
The silence of sorrow .it seems to supply,

And asks me for why I am here.

'Poor victim! no idle intruder has stood,

With o'erweening complacence our state to compare,

But one whose first wish is the wish to be good,
Is come as thy brother thy sorrows to share.

'At thy name, though compassion her nature resign, Though in virtue's proud mouth thy report be a stain,

My care, if the arm of the mighty were mine,
Should place thee where yet thou may'st blossom again.'




Why dost thou weepe, O gentle Ladye? Why dost thou grieve, O Ladye fayre?

Why is thy lovelye baby presste

In anguish to thye throbbing breaste? And why that look of black despayre?

Why dost thou sit forlorne and sigh?

Sweetest Ladye, tell me why.

I have cause to weepe, kind stranger,
I have a tale of woe to tell:

It is an orphan babe that's presste

In anguishe to a widowed breaste; On Cressie's playne his father fell—

Then aske not, gentle stranger, why

Thus forlorne I sit and sigh.

Nathless comfort take, fayre Ladye,
And let thy griefe assuaged bee;

For on a grateful nation's breaste
Thou and this orphan babe shall reste,
While I will sit and weepe with thee;
For bleste the tears that waile the brave,
And drop upon a hero's grave.



We met—we gazed—I saw and sighed

She did not speak, and yet replied:

There are ten thousand tones and signs

We hear and see, but none defines—

Involuntary sparks of thought,

Which strike from out the heart o'erwrought,

And form a strange intelligence,

Alike mysterious and intense,

Which link the burning chain that binds,

Without their will, young hearts and minds;

Conveying, as the electric wire,

We know not how, the absorbing fire—

I saw, and sighed—in silence wept,

And still reluctant distance kept,

Until.I was made known to her,

And we might then and there confer

Without suspicion—then, even then,

I longed, and. was resolved to speak; But on my lips they died again,

The accents tremulous and weak, Until one hour.—There is a game, A frivolous and foolish play, Wherewith we while away the day; It is—I have forgot the name— And we to this, it seems, were set, By some strange chance, which I forget: I recked not if I won or lost, It was enough for me to be So near to her, and oh I to see The being whom I loved the most— I watched her as a sentinel, (May ours this dark night watch as well!) Until I saw, and thus it was, That she was pensive, nor perceived Her occupation, nor was grieved. Nor glad to lose or gain; but still Played on for hours, as if her will Yet bound her to the place, though not That hers might be the winning lot. Then through my brain the thought did pass Even as a flash of lightning there,

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