And hark! the thatcher has begun
His whistle on the eaves,

And oft the hedger's bill is heard
Among the rustling leaves.

The slow team creeks upon the road,
The noisy whip resounds,

The driver's voice, his carol blithe,
The mower's stroke, his whetting scythe
Mix with the morning's sounds.

Who would not rather take his seat
Beneath these clumps of trees,
The early dawn of day to greet,
And catch the healthy breeze,
Than on the silken couch of Sloth
Luxurious to lie;

Who would not from life's dreary waste
Snatch, when he could, with eager haste,
An interval of joy!

To him who simply thus recounts

The morning's pleasures o'er,

Fate dooms, ere long, the scene must close
To ope on him no more.

Yet Morning! unrepining still,

He'll greet thy beams awhile;
And surely thou, when o'er his grave
Solemn the whispering willows wave,
Wilt sweetly on him smile:

And the pale glowworm's pensive light

Will guide his ghostly walks in the drear moonless night.

ON DISAPPOINTMENT.

COME, Disappointment, come!
Not in thy terrors clad;

Come, in thy meekest, saddest guise;
Thy chastening rod but terrifies

The restless and the bad.

But I recline

Beneath thy shrine,

[twine.

And round my brow resign'd thy peaceful cypress

Though Fancy flies away

Before thy hollow tread,

Yet Meditation, in her cell,

Hears with faint eye the lingering knell

That tells her hopes are dead;

And though the tear

By chance appear,

[here.

Yet she can smile, and say, My all was not laid

Come, Disappointment, come!

Though from Hope's summit hurl'd,
Still, rigid Nurse, thou art forgiven,
For thou severe wert sent from heaven

To wean me from the world;

To turn my eye

From vanity,

And point to scenes of bliss that never, never die.

What is this passing scene?

A peevish April day!
A little sun-a little rain,

And then night sweeps along the plain,
And all things fade away.

Man (soon discuss'd)

Yields up his trust,

And all his hopes and fears lie with him in the dust.

Oh, what is Beauty's power?

It flourishes and dies;

Will the cold earth its silence break,

To tell how soft, how smooth a cheek

Beneath its surface lies?

Mute, mute is all

O'er Beauty's fall;

[pall.

Her praise resounds no more when mantled in her

The most beloved on earth

Not long survives to-day;

So music past is obsolete,

And yet 'twas sweet, 'twas passing sweet,

But now 'tis gone away.

Thus does the shade

In memory fade,

When in forsaken tomb the form beloved is laid.

Then since this world is vain,

And volatile, and fleet,

Why should I lay up earthly joys,

Where rust corrupts, and moth destroys,

N

And cares and sorrows eat?

Why fly from ill

With anxious skill,

When soon this hand will freeze, this throbbing heart be still.

Come, Disappointment, come!
Thou art not stern to me;
Sad Monitress! I own thy sway,
A votary sad in early day,

I bend my knee to thee.
From sun to sun

My race will run,

I only bow, and say, My God, thy will be done!

On another paper are a few lines, written probably in the freshness of his disappointment.

I dream no more—the vision flies away,
And Disappointment

There fell my hopes-I lost my all in this,
My cherish'd all of visionary bliss.
Now hope farewell, farewell all joys below;
Now welcome sorrow, and now welcome woe.
Plunge me in glooms

ON THE DEATH OF DERMODY THE POET.

CHILD of Misfortune! Offspring of the Muse! Mark like the meteor's gleam his mad career; With hollow cheeks and haggard eye, Behold he shrieking passes by :

That hollow scream, that deepening groan;
It rings upon mine ear.

Oh come, ye thoughtless, ye deluded youth,
Who clasp the syren pleasure to your breast,
Behold the wreck of genius here,

And drop, oh drop the silent tear
For Dermody at rest:

His fate is yours, then from your loins
Tear quick the silken vest.

Saw'st thou his dying bed! Saw'st thou his

eye,

Once flashing fire, despair's dim tear distil; How ghastly did it seem

And then his dying scream:

Oh God! I hear it still:

It sounds upon my fainting sense,

It strikes with deathly chill.