Yes, let him sleep,-and wake to toil again!
Yet be there other sleepers, round whose bed.
The balmy tears of eve are wept in vain;

And morn will smile-it cannot wake the dead. Spirits of song!—my brethren !—are ye fled ?— Ye have not lived to rue a tyrant's hate,

To see your shrines-your dwellings ravished; I do not dare not mourn your glorious fate; But feel that ye are gone,—and I am desolate.

My lonely lyre !-my hand is on thy string,-
It is the last-last time!-my childhood's toy,—
Fond solace of my youth, wilt thou not bring
To my last hour one parting note of joy ?—
I do remember, when a wayward boy,

How I would woo thee, till my soul caught fire,

And glowed—and maddened in the sweet employ :

How I would far from human eye retire,

To talk in solitude with thee,-my lonely lyre!

Then, Mona! 'mid thy forest-grandeur nursed,

I drank the rapture of thy Druid's strain; Then airy forms on fancy's slumber burst,

And youth's bright dreams, as beautiful as vain.

Yet not at once that Druid loosed the chain

That bound my soul, and bade it, madly whirled

In fire-wheeled car, Heaven's peerless height attain :

But darkly,' slowly the dread truth unfurled,

And drew the curtain back, that veils another world.

Sweet Memory! touched by thee, enjoyment past
A brighter hue-a livelier beauty wears;
And thou art wont, in playful mood, to cast
The rainbow's lustre o'er a scene of tears:
Thus now, beneath thy softened tint, appears
The pang-the struggle, when my soul was riven

From all of earth that soothes, enchants, endears, From human passion's blandishment,—and given, With all its warmth of zeal, to solitude and heaven.

BB

The faith I cherished was a feeling rife

With poesy and grandeur and delight.

Oh! when Belinus woke the world to life,

My eager hand would rouse his 3 beacon bright !— My song would chide the lingering gloom of night! And, as he rose, and, flinging from the sky

4

Round Snowdon's brow his glittering wreath of light,

Laughed on the waves, that smiled responsively,

My spirit caught a glow for mortal breast too high.

And him-the storm-god Taranis, whose eye

Glares through the clouds in lightning, where the rout

Of mingled elements rolls hurrying by—

Him have I worshipped; and his awful shout—

That chorus, by his deep voice bellowed out,

Was full of joy and melody to me.

I loved to hear it leap heaven's vault about; Till earth took up the song with noisy glee,

And pealed from all her hills its fierce antistrophe.5

6

There be some moments to our musing given

Full of eternity!—and such were mine;

When I could feel this bosom-spark of Heaven,

This purer essence of a breath divine

Gaze back on what it had been-to its shrine

Of other years; or raise, in shadowy files,

Visions of future being, till it shine

Throned in the splendor of those sunny isles,

Where endless pleasures reign, and cloudless beauty smiles.

But such were lonely joys !-The festive song,
The slow procession and the solemn rite,

The shout, that rung the startled woods among,

"Gather the mystic branch, the year's last night
"Melts into morn !"-these once could wake delight;

'Twas proud to see the Druid throng sweep by,

Their white robes glistening in the moon's young light,

Which, struggling through the oak's dark shade on high, Glanced on the scene below of sacred revelry.

Oft too we tracked the forest's deep abyss,
To seek such wilding herb, or summer flower,
In whose bright chalice evening's dewy kiss

Nursed health or poison:-at this dreadful hour
I thank those venomed leaves, whose kindly power
Shall free my longing spirit:-once I blessed

A charm, that, gathered from a fairer bower,

Poured refluent vigour through the purest breast That e'er for mortal youth love's trembling flame confessed.

Yes, I did love her, though that love to me

Was all forbidden rapture!-her pale cheek Sunk on my throbbing breast, and droopingly Bowed her frail form, so delicately weak ;

I waved the vervain-bough, and strove to speak The potent spell-oh heaven! it died away,

Her eye's delirious fire-the livid streak

That stained her brow! and, in its stead, a ray

Beamed forth, more mildly bright than parting blush of day.