POETRY.

ODE FOR THE NEW YEAR, 1808.
BY HENRY JAMES PYE, ESQ. P. L.

[Performed at St. James's, on her Majesty's Birth-Day.]

B

yon

EHOLD lurid Orb that seems
Devious thro' æther's paths to stray,
And, while with baleful light it gleams,
Appears to trace no certain way;
No influence mild with genial force
Waits on its desultory course:
But myriads view its streaming hair
Shed death and horror thro' the air,
While even Science' piercing sight,

Clear from the mists of visionary fears,
Anxious beholds the erratie Stranger's flight,
Lest mingling with the planetary spheres,
It shake the order of the mighty frame,

Destroy with ponderous shock, or melt with sulphurous flame.

Such is, alas! the dread that waits
On savage Inroad's wild career,

While trembling round, the peaceful States
Survey its meteor course with fear;

And as the immortal mandate guides,

And points the Comet where to stray;

So thro' the battle's crimson tides

It points Ambition's fatal way;

Submissive both th' Eternal's will perform,

As act his high behest the earthquake and the storm.

But as

with ray_benign and bland

The radiant Ruler of the year Sheds plenty on the smiling land

Where'er his vivifying beams appear, Now wakes the roseate bloom of Spring, Fann'd by young Zephyr's tepid wing,

Or

Or clothes the wide-expanding plain,
With Summer's fruits, or Autumn's grain,
Or gathering from the watery shores
Sources of vegetable stores,

Renews scorch'd Earth's exhausted powers
With balmy dews and gentle showers;
So from the patriot Monarch's care,
Whose breast no dreams of conquest move,
Founding his glory on his people's love,

And proud to boast unbounded empire there,
The copious rills of Peace domestic stream,

Warm glows fair Virtue's flame, and bright Religion's beam.

O BRITAIN, may thy happy coast,
Tho' loud oppression rage around,

To the applauding nations boast

One shore with peace, with mercy crown'd:

Still may thy hospitable seat

To suffering greatness yield a safe retreat!

For when the sacred fiat of the skies

First caus'd thy sea-encircled Realm to rise,

It bade it an eternal column stand,*

Sacred to want and woe from every clime and land,

ODE FOR THE KING'S BIRTH-DAY.

N

[By the Same.]

'OT with more joy when gathering round,
Dark mists the face of Heaven deform,
When howls the wind with hollow sound,
Preluding to the rising storm;
We thro' the severing clouds descry
Of cheering light a golden gleam:
And hail awhile the clearing sky,

And feel awhile the genial beam;

Than now, when spreading wide and far,
Roars the tremendous peal of war,

We bless of peace and joy the ray,

That gilds the happy hours of GEORGE'S natal day,

From regions wrapp'd in endless snow,
Eternal Winter's drear domain,
To where Sol's fervid axles glow
Incessant o'er the arid plain,
The Muses look with anxious eye
To see the clouds of discord fly,
* Pind. Olymp. viii. Strophe 2,

That

That the loud clarion's warlike sound,
Which awes a trembling world, may cease,
And all their tuneful choir around

May strike the lyre to notes of Peace;
The scenes of horror and of death be o'er,
And fell Ambition grasp her iron rod no more.

Vain are their hopes, their vows are vain ;
War still protracts his bloody reign;
And when these halcyon hours are past,
That lull awhile the stormy blast,

The Muse again in martial lays,

Must bid her voice the Song of Battle raise;
Must show that all the joys that smile
On Britain's Heaven-protected Isle,
Call on her Sons with tenfold might

To stem the threatening waves of fight,

Whelm in the ensanguin'd tide their country's foes,
And guard with giant arm the blessings Heaven bestows.

INTRODUCTION TO CANTO SECOND OF MARMION.
By W. SCOTT, Esq.

THEN, musing on companions gone,
We doubly feel ourselves alone,
Something, my friend, we yet may gain,
There is a pleasure in this pain:
It soothes the love of lonely rest,
Deep in each gentler heart impressed.
'Tis silent amid worldly toils,
And stifled soon by mental broils;
But, in a bosom thus prepared,
Its still small voice is often heard,
Whispering a mingled sentiment,
'Twixt resignation and content.
Oft in my mind such thoughts awake,
By lone St. Mary's silent lake;

Thou know't it well,---nor fen, nor sedge,
Pollute the pure lake's crystal edge;
Abrupt and sheer, the mountains sink
At once upon the level brink;
And just a trace of silver sand
Marks where the water meets the land.
Far in the mirror, bright and blue,
Each hill's huge outline you may view ;
Shaggy with heath, but lonely bare,
Nor tree, nor bush, nor brake is there,

Save where, of land, yon slender lice
Bears thwart the lake the scattered pine.
Yet even this nakedness has power,
And aids the feeling of the hour:
Nor thicket, dell, nor copse you spy,
Where living thing concealed might lie;
Nor point, retiring, hides a dell,

Where swain, or woodman lone, might dwell;
There's nothing left to fancy's guess,

You see that all is loneliness:

And silence aids-though the steep hills
Send to the lake a thousand rills;

In summer tide, so soft they weep,
The sound but lulls the ear asleep ;
Your horse's hoof-tread sounds too rude,
So stilly is the solitude.

Nought living meets the eye or ear,
But well I ween the dead are near ;
For though, in feudal strife, a foe
Hath laid Our Lady's chapel low,
Yet still, beneath the hallowed soil,
The peasant rests him from his toil,
And, dying, bids his bones be laid,
Where erst his simple fathers prayed.

If age had tamed the passions' strife,
And fate had cut my ties to life,
Here have I thought, 'twere sweet to dwell,
And rear again the chaplain's cell,
Like that same peaceful hermitage,
Where Milton longed to spend his age.
'Twere sweet to mark the setting day,
On Bourhope's lonely top decay;
And, as it faint and feeble died,

To say,

On the broad lake, and mountain's side,
"Thus pleasures fade away;
Youth, talents, beauty thus decay,
And leave us dark, forlorn, and gray;"-
Then gaze on Dryhope's ruined tower,
And think on Yarrow's faded Flower:
And when that mountain-sound I heard
Which bids us be for storm prepar'd,—
The distant rustling of his wings,
As up his force the Tempest brings,-
'Twere sweet, ere yet his terrors rave,
To sit upon the Wizard's grave;

That Wizard Priest's, whose bones are thrust
From company of holy dust;

On