POEMS.

In addition to the verses occasionally introduced in the preceding pages, there are the following further poetical productions of Mr. Curran, the omission of which (it has been suggested) would be regretted by many readers, particularly by those of his own country.

Addressed to Lady

LINES

-, in answer to a poem in which she had predicted the future freedom of Ireland.

THE western sun o'er Dalua's flood
The castle's length'ning shadow flung
To heaven, the minstrels of the wood
The vesper song of nature sung.

Clasp'd in her arms, fair Marion's boy
Now lost his infant cares in rest;

Or basking in his mother's joy,

Drank health and virtue from her breast.

Her form-but stay, rash poet! stay,
Nor vainly paint the beauteous shrine,
Unless thy pencil can pourtray

The form divine that dwells within.

She saw the hearse that ling'ring slow,
Scarce seem'd the opposing hill to climb;
She heard the mingling sounds of woe,
For manhood fall'n before its time.

His arm had smote his country's foe,
For her his heart had scorn'd to fear;
But civil feud had laid him low,

The laurel wither'd on his bier.

His old sire tott'ring to his tomb,
Bewail'd his age's comfort fled;
His love, too, follow'd, craz'd and dumb,
In grief that had no tears to shed.
The mournful train, th' untimely blow,
In Marion's patriot mind awoke ;
The sleeping forms of Erin's woe,

The blood-stain'd tow'r, the stranger yoke.

Her various memory moves the veil
That hid the deeds of parted times,
And tells her wounded soul the tale

Of Erin's shames, of Albion's crimes.
With rapid glance her thought survey'd
Of fiends obscene the ghastly band,
By tyrant perfidy array'd,

To lord it o'er a victim land.

Pale sloth with vice and misery join'd,
And credulous faith and discord dire;

And superstition bloody and blind,

Kindling her sacramental fire.

"How long," she cried, "O! Power Supreme,

By folly shall the world be sway'd?

Oh, virtue, art thou but a name,

Oh, freedom, art thou but a shade!

"And thou, dread justice, canst thou sleep,
While hopeless millions pine forlorn ;
While crimes their frantic revels keep,
And laugh thy tardy power to scorn?
"Canst thou behold th' unworthy yoke
Crush all that's gen'rous, all that's good?
Is there no wrath?" But while she spoke,
An ancient form before her stood.

To view the venerable sage,

She raised her eye, that o'er his head Soft beaming on the marks of age, Sweet youth's celestial lustre shed. So on the mountain's snow-clad brow, When falls the light of parting day, The drifted whiteness seems to glow, Illumed, not melted, in the ray. "No! Justice never sleeps," he said: "In every age, in every clime, She levels at the guilty head,

And measures punishment by crime. "Deep woven in the frame of things Is Heaven's unchangeable decree, From guilt alone that misery springs, That virtue only can be free.

"The rage of war, the bigot fire,

The storm that lifts th' insatiate main, The pest that piles the carnage dire, Are but the servants of her reign.

"When most the tyrant seems to rave, 'Tis justice that afflicts mankind, And makes the body of the slave Fit jail for the degenerate mind.

By patriot rage, when Julius bled, The tyrant still escaped his doom, And lived (tho' Brutus' friend lay dead) Immortal in the crimes of Rome.

"Yet victor in the generous strife, For freedom he resign'd his breath; He sought it in the dream of life, He found it in the sleep of death. "For nature, ever in her prime, Sleeps but to renovate her force; And pausing from the toils of time,

Takes breath for her eternal course.

"Perhaps the moment may arrive

When Erin's sons shall think like thee;
That moment she begins to live,
And virtuous Erin to be free.

« Till then, in vain the patriot deed,
Till then condemn'd a hopeless slave,
Erin may struggle or may bleed,

But freedom dwells beyond the grave."

A LETTER IN RHYME TO A FRIEND.

Dublin, Dec. 3, 1798.

DEAR Dick, in answer to your letter,
These presents take instead of better;
And hard it is enough, God knows,

To write in verse, and think in prose.
For when those baggages of Muses,
No matter how a bard them uses,
Get but a peep at's Sapience big,
His goat's-beard band, and proper wig,
They, void of modesty or grace,
Do sneer and titter in his face;

Then leave him to his own bad leading,
To eke out rhyme with special pleading.
Without them, then, we'll what we can do,
And more than that can mortal man do?

"But why not answer long before? Why silent for a month or more ?"

My packet for the Head had parted

Ere yours from Church-lane dock had started.
But here arrived it safely lay,

Un-Lees'd, un-Sirr'd *, for many a day.
No studious spy the seal explored,
Nor angling minion hook'd a word.

*Lees and Sirr, officers of search in the rebellion.

But all your notions, as you wrote 'em,
In statu quo, just so I got 'em.
Uncrack'd as egg in new-mown hay,
Or well-primed cheek of Lady Gay,
Or cozy gammon snugg'd in malt,
The virtue suck of attic salt.

So you bring Madam up to town,
To see her friends and choose a gown,
To slack a few of those hard guineas,
You roach by prosodizing ninnies.
Of many a welcome' you're secure,
' Of beds you are not quite so sure.'
There you mistake, 'tis the reverse,
The beds are many-welcomes scarce.
When welcome is a word, 'tis many,
When 'tis a thing, most rare of any.
The churl that simpers at the door,
Swears that you're welcome-Oh, most sure!
Again a thousand welcomes swears,
And starves your guts and crams your ears;
Yet inly damns the ling'ring drone,
You're welcome, but you're better gone.

One single welcome here you'll find,
But that of far a different kind;
Nor yet that welcome be afraid of,
I'll tell you what's the stuff 'tis made of.
A head and heart you may have known;
The heart at least, 'twas much your own.
I know not if the head you knew y;
Both should be better-both knew you.

This luckless heart in early days,
Not dead to worth, not dead to praise,
Yet suffer'd many a dire disaster
From careless thrift of thoughtless master.
A cymbal not inaptly strung,
A cymbal of no native song-
'Twas silent, or it gave the note,
As Circe or Minerva smote;