FAREWELL.

FAREWELL! if ever fondest

prayer For other's weal availed on high, Mine will not all be lost in air,

But waft thy name beyond the sky. 'Twere vain to speak, to weep, to sigh :

Oh! more than tears of blood can tell, When wrung from guilt's expiring eye, Are in that word-Farewell!-Farewell!

These lips are mute, these eyes are dry;
But in my breast, and in my brain,
Awake the

pangs that pass not by,

The thought that ne'er shall sleep again. My soul nor deigns nor dares complain, Though grief and passion there rebel; I only know we loved in vainI only feel-Farewell! Farewell!

TO A YOUTHFUL FRIEND.

FEW

Few years have passed since thou and I
Were firmest friends, at least in name,
And childhood's gay sincerity

Preserved our feelings long the same.

But now,

like me, too well thou know'st
What trifles oft the heart recall;

And those who once have loved the most,
Too soon forget they loved at all.

And such the change the heart displays,
So frail is carly friendship's reign,
A month's brief lapse, perhaps a day's,
Will view thy mind estranged again.

If so, it never shall be mine

To mourn the loss of such a heart; The fault was Nature's fault, not thine, Which made thee fickle as thou art.

As rolls the Ocean's changing tide,
So human feelings ebb and flow;
And who would in a breast confide
Where stormy passions ever glow?

It boots not, that together bred,
Our childish days were days of joy;
My spring of life has quickly fled;
Thou, too, hast ceased to be a boy.

****

And when we bid adieu to youth,
Slaves to the specious world's controul,
We sigh a long farewell to truth;
That world corrupts the noblest soul.

Ah! joyous season! when the mind
Dares all things boldly but to lie;
When thought ere spoke is unconfined,
And sparkles in the placid eye.

Not so in man's maturer years,
When man himself is but a tool;
When interest sways our hopes and fears,
And all must love and hate by rule.

With fools in kindred vice the same,
We learn at length our faults to blend,
And those, and those alone may
The prostituted name of friend.

Such is the common lot of man :

claim

Can we then 'scape from folly free?

Can we reverse the general plan,

Nor be what all in turn must be?

No, for myself, so dark my fate
Through every turn of life hath been;
Man and the world I so much hate,
I care not when I quit the scene.

Put thou, with spirit frail and light,
Wilt shine awhile and pass away;
As glow-worms sparkle through the night,
But dare not stand the test of day.

Alas! whenever folly calls

Where parasites and princes meet, (For cherished first in royal halls, The welcome vices kindly greet),

E'en now thou'rt nightly seen to add
One insect to the fluttering crowd;
And still thy trifling heart is glad

To join the vain and court the proud.

There dost thou glide from fair to fair,
Still simpering on with eager haste,
As flies along the gay parterre,

That taint the flowers they scarcely taste.

But say, what nymph will prize the flame
Which seems, as marshy vapours move,

To flit along from dame to dame,
An ignis-fatuus gleam of love?

What friend for thee, howe'er inclined,
Will deign to own a kindred care?
Who will debase his manly mind

For friendship every fool may share?

In time forbear; amidst the throng
No more so base a thing be seen;

No more so idly pass along :

Be something, any thing, but-mean.

TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ.

ABSENT or present, still to thee,

My friend, what magic spells belong! As all can tell, who share, like me,

In turu thy converse, and thy song.
But when the dreaded hour shall come

By friendship ever deemed too nigh,
And « MEMORY » o'er her Druid's tomb
Shall sweep that aught of thee can die,
How fondly will She then repay

Thy homage offered at her shrine,

And blend, while Ages roll away,

Her name immortally with thine!

April 19th, 1812.

ON A CORNELIAN HEART

WHICH WAS BROKEN.

ILL-FATED Heart! and can it be

That thou should'st thus be rent in twain?

Have years of care for thine and thee
Alike been all employed in vain?

Yet precious seems each shattered part,
And every fragment dearer grown,
Since he who wears thee, feels thou art
A fitter emblem of his own.