"Except thou quit thy former love,

66

"Content to dwell for

aye

with me,

Thy scorn my finny frame might move "To tear thy limbs amid the sea.'

"Then bear me swift along the main,
"The lonely isle again to see,
"And when I here return again,

"I plight my faith to dwell with thee."

An oozy film her limbs o'erspread,
While slow unfolds her scaly train,
With gluey fangs her hands were clad,
She lash'd with webbed fin the main.

He grasps the Mermaid's scaly sides,
As with broad fin she oars her way;
Beneath the silent moon she glides,
That sweetly sleeps on Colonsay.

Proud swells her heart! she deems, at last, To lure him with her silver tongue,

And, as the shelving rocks she past,

She rais'd her voice and sweetly.sung..

Slow gliding o'er the moonlight bay, When light to land the chieftain sprung, To hail the maid of Colonsay.

O sad the Mermaid's gay notes fell,
And sadly sink remote at sea!
So sadly mourns the writhed shell
Of Jura's shore its parent sea.

The charm-bound sailors know the day; For sadly still the Mermaid mourns The lovely chief of Colonsay.

I

ON

THE SABBATH MORNING.

WITH silent awe I hail the sacred morn,

That slowly wakes while all the fields are still! A soothing calm on every breeze is borne;

A

graver murmur gurgles from the rill; And echo answers softer from the hill;

And softer sings the linnet from the thorn;
The sky-lark warbles in a tone less shrill.
Hail, light serene! hail, sacred Sabbath-morn!
The rooks float silent by in airy drove ;

The sun a placid yellow lustre throws;

The gales, that lately sigh'd along the grove,
Have hush'd their downy wings in dead repose;
The hovering rack of clouds forgets to move; -

So smil❜d the day when the first morn arose !

ODE,

TO THE SCENES OF INFANCY.

WRITTEN IN 1801.

My native stream, my native vale,
And you, green meads of Teviotdale,
That after absence long I view!

Your bleakest scenes, that rise around,
Assume the tints of fairy ground,
And infancy revive anew.

Thrice blest the days I here have seen, When light I trac'd that margin green, Blithe as the linnet on the spray;

As

And thought the days would ever last
gay and cheerful as the past;
The sunshine of a summer's day.

Fair visions, innocently sweet!
Though soon you pass'd on viewless feet,
And vanish'd to, return no more;

Still, when this anxious breast shall grieve,
You shall my pensive heart relieve,

And every former joy restore.

When first around mine infant head
Delusive dreams their visions shed,

To soften or to soothe the soul;
In every scene, with glad surprise,
I saw my native groves arise,

And Teviot's crystal waters roll.

And when religion rais'd my view
Beyond this concave's azure blue,

Where flowers of fairer lustre blow, Where Eden's groves again shall bloom, Beyond the desart of the tomb,

And living streams for ever flow,

The groves of soft celestial dye
Were such as oft had met mine eye,
Expanding green on Teviot's side;
The living stream, whose pearly wave
In fancy's eye appear'd to lave,

Resembled Teviot's limpid tide.