2.

One gone 'twas time to seek a second;
In sooth 'twere hard to blame thy haste.
And whatsoe'er thy love be reckoned,

At least thou hast improved in taste :
Though one was young, the next was younger,
His love was new, mine too well known-
And what might make the charm still stronger,
The youth was present, I was flown.

3.

Seven days and nights of single sorrow!
Too much for human constancy!

A fortnight past, why then to-morrow,
His turn is come to follow me :
And if each week you change a lover,
And so have acted heretofore,

Before a year or two is over

We'll form a very pretty corps.

4.

Adieu, fair thing! without upbraiding
I fain would take a decent leave;
Thy beauty still survives unfading,
And undeceived may long deceive.
With him unto thy bosom dearer
Enjoy the moments as they flee;

I only wish his love sincerer

Than thy young heart has been to me.

1812.

[From a MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now for the first time printed.]

REMEMBER HIM, WHOM PASSION'S POWER.1

I.

REMEMBER him, whom Passion's power

Severely deeply-vainly proved:
Remember thou that dangerous hour,

When neither fell, though both were loved..

2.

That yielding breast, that melting eye,"
Too much invited to be blessed :
That gentle prayer, that pleading sigh,
The wilder wish reproved, repressed.

But saved thee all that Conscience fears;

And blush for every pang it cost

To spare the vain remorse of years.

4.

Yet think of this when many a tongue,
Whose busy accents whisper blame,
Would do the heart that loved thee wrong,
And brand a nearly blighted name.iv.

i. To him who loves and her who loved.-[MS. M.]
ii. That trembling form .—[MS. M.]

iii. Resigning thee, alas! I lost

Joys bought too dear, if bright with tears,

Yet ne'er regret the pangs it cost.-[MS. M. erased.]

I. [It is possible that these lines, as well as the Sonnets "To Genevra," were addressed to Lady Frances Wedderburn Webster. -See Letters, 1898, ii. 2, note 1 ; and Letters, 1899, iii. 8, note 1.]

5.

Think that, whate'er to others, thou

Hast seen each selfish thought subdued:

I bless thy purer soul even now,

Even now, in midnight solitude.

6.

Oh, God! that we had met in time,
Our hearts as fond, thy hand more free;
When thou hadst loved without a crime,
And I been less unworthy thee!"

7.

Far may thy days, as heretofore,.
From this our gaudy world be past!
And that too bitter moment o'er,
Oh! may such trial be thy last.

8.

This heart, alas! perverted long,

Itself destroyed might there destroy;

To meet thee in the glittering throng, Would wake Presumption's hope of joy..

9.

Then to the things whose bliss or woe,
Like mine, is wild and worthless all,
That world resign-such scenes forego,
Where those who feel must surely fall.

IO.

Thy youth, thy charms, thy tenderness-
Thy soul from long seclusion pure;

i. And I been not unworthy thee.-[MS. M.]

iii. Might make my hope of guilty joy.—[MS.]

From what even here hath passed, may guess
What there thy bosom must endure.

II.

Oh! pardon that imploring tear,
Since not by Virtue shed in vain,
My frenzy drew from eyes so dear;
For me they shall not weep again.

12.

Though long and mournful must it be,
The thought that we no more may meet;

Yet I deserve the stern decree,

And almost deem the sentence sweet.

13.

Still had I loved thee less-my heart
Had then less sacrificed to thine;

It felt not half so much to part

As if its guilt had made thee mine.

1813.

[MS. M. First published, Childe Harold, 1814 (Seventh Edition).]

IMPROMPTU, IN REPLY TO A FRIEND.1

WHEN, from the heart where Sorrow sits,
Her dusky shadow mounts too high,

1. [Byron forwarded these lines to Moore in a postscript to a letter dated September 27, 1813. "Here's," he writes, 66 an impromptu for you by a person of quality,' written last week, on being reproached for low spirits."-Letters, 1898, ii. 268. They were written at Aston Hall, Rotherham, where he "stayed a week and behaved very well-though the lady of the house [Lady F. Wedderburn Webster] is young, and religious, and pretty, and the master is my particular friend."-Letters, 1898, ii. 267.]

...

And o'er the changing aspect flits,

And clouds the brow, or fills the eye;

Heed not that gloom, which soon shall sink :
My Thoughts their dungeon know too well;
Back to my breast the Wanderers shrink,

And droop within their silent cell.

September, 1813.

LMS. M. First published, Childe Harold, 1814 (Seventh Edition).]

SONNET.

TO GENEVRA.

THINE eyes' blue tenderness, thy long fair hair,
And the warm lustre of thy features-caught
From contemplation-where serenely wrought,
Seems Sorrow's softness charmed from its despair-
Have thrown such speaking sadness in thine air,
That-but I know thy blesséd bosom fraught
With mines of unalloyed and stainless thought-
I should have deemed thee doomed to earthly care.
With such an aspect, by his colours blent,

When from his beauty-breathing pencil born,
(Except that thou hast nothing to repent)
The Magdalen of Guido saw the morn—
Such seem'st thou-but how much more excellent!
With nought Remorse can claim-nor Virtue scorn.
December 17, 1813.1

[MS. M. First published, Corsair, 1814 (Second Edition).]

i. And bleed —.—[MS. M.]

1. ["Redde some Italian, and wrote two Sonnets. . . . I never wrote but one sonnet before, and that was not in earnest, and many years ago, as an exercise-and I will never write another. They are the most puling, petrifying, stupidly platonic compositions."— Diary, December 18, 1813; Letters, 1898, ii. 379.]