AT the close of day, when the hamlet is still,

And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove,

When nought but the torrent is heard on the hill, And nought but the nightingale's song in the grove; 'Twas thus, by the cave of the mountain afar,

While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit began: No more with himself or with nature at war, He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man.

"Ah! why, thus abandon'd to darkness and woe,
Why, lone Philomela, that languishing fall!
For spring shall return, and a lover bestow,

And sorrow no longer thy bosom enthrall.
But, if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay,

Mourn, sweetest complainer, man calls thee to mourn; O, sooth him whose pleasures like thine pass away: Full quickly they pass, but they never return.

"Now gliding remote, on the verge of the sky,
The moon half extinguish'd her crescent displays:
But lately I mark'd, when majestic on high

She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze.
Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue

The path that conducts thee to splendor again, But man's faded glory, what change shall renew! Ah, fool! to exult in a glory so vain!

""Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more;
I mourn, but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you;
For morn is approaching, your charms to restore,
Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glitt'ring with dew:
Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn;

Kind nature the embryo blossom will save.
But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn!
O! when shall it dawn on the night of the grave!

"'Twas thus, by the glare of false science betray'd, That leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind:

My thoughts wont to roam, from shade onward to shade,

Destruction before me and sorrow behind.

'O pity, great Father of light,' then I cried,

'Thy creature, who fain would not wander from thee; Lo, humbled in dust, I relinquish my pride:

From doubt and from darkness thou only can'st free.'

"And darkness and doubt are now flying away;
No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn:
So breaks on the traveller, faint and astray,
The bright and the balmy effulgence of morn.
See Truth, Love, and Mercy in triumph descending,
And nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom!
On the cold cheek of Death smiles and roses are blending,
And Beauty immortal awakes from the tomb."

MORNING LANDSCAPE.

(FROM THE "MINSTREL.")

EVEN now his eyes with smiles of rapture glow,
As on he wanders through the scenes of morn,
Where the fresh flowers in living lustre blow,
Where thousand pearls the dewy lawns adorn,
A thousand notes of joy in every breeze are borne.

But who the melodies of morn can tell?

The wild brook bubbling down the mountain side;

The lowing herd; the sheepfold's simple bell;
The pipe of early shepherd dim descried
In the lone valley; echoing far and wide
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above;
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide;

The hum of bees, the linnet's lay of love,
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.

The cottage curs at early pilgrim bark;

Crowned with her pail, the tripping milkmaid sings; The whistling plowman stalks afield; and hark!

Down the rough slope the ponderous wagon rings; Through the rustling corn the hare astonished springs; Slow tolls the village clock the drowsy hour; The partridge bursts away on whizzing wings, Deep mourns the turtle in sequestered bower, And shrill lark carols clear from her aëriel tower.

JAMES MACPHERSON.

1738-1796.

JAMES MACPHERSON was born in Kingussie, a village in Invernessshire, in 1738. He was intended for the church, and received the necessary education at Aberdeen. For a short time he taught the school of Ruthven, but subsequently became tutor in the family of Mr. Graham, of Balgowan. While in this position, he published a little volume of sixty pages, entitled Fragments of Ancient Poetry, translated from the Gaelic or Erse language, which attracted much attention. A subscription was at once organized to enable him to make a tour in the Highlands to collect other pieces. In 1762 he presented the world with Fingal, an ancient epic poem in six books; and in 1763 Temora, another epic poem in eight books. The sale of these works was immense. The possibility that, in the third or fourth century, among the wild rural mountains of Scotland, there existed a people exhibiting all the high and Christian feelings of refined valor, generosity, magnanimity and virtue, was eminently calculated to excite astonishment, while the idea that these poems had been handed down by tradition through so many centuries among rude and barbarous tribes, was no less astounding. Many doubted, others disbelieved, but a still greater number indulged the pleasing supposition that "Fingal fought and Ossian sung." In 1779 the poet purchased an estate in his native town, where he died on the 17th February, 1796, leaving a handsome fortune, which is still enjoyed by his family.

The fierce controversy that raged for some time as to the authenticity of the poems of Ossian, the incredulity of Johnson, and the