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Sweeten the breeze, and mingling swim
On every bowl's voluptuous brim !

Give me the wreath that withers there,
It was but last delicious night
It hung upon her wavy hair,

And caught her eyes' reflected light! Oh! haste, and twine it round my brow;

It breaths of Heliodora now!

The loving rose-bud drops a tear,
To see the nymph no longer here,
No longer, where she used to lie,
Close to my heart's devoted sigh!

Oh! most to him,

Whose lip hath drained life's cup of
Nor left one honey-drop to shed
pleasure,
Round misery's brim.

Yes-he can smile serene at death:
Kind Heaven! do thou but chase the
weeping

Of friends who love him;
Tell them that he lies calmly sleeping,
Where sorrow's sting or envy's breath
No more shall move him.

LINES.

WRITTEN IN A STORM AT SEA.

THAT Sky of clouds is not the sky
To light a lover to the pillow

Of her he loves

The swell of yonder foaming billow,
Resembles not the happy sigh

That rapture moves.

Yet do I feel more tranquil now
Amid the gloomy wilds of ocean,
In this dark hour,

Than when, in transport's young emo-
tion,

I've stolen, beneath the evening star,
To Julia's bower.

Oh! there's a holy calm profound
In awe like this, that ne'er was given
To rapture's thrill;
'Tis as a solemn voice from heaven,
And the soul, listening to the sound,
Lies mute and still!

'Tis true, it talks of danger nigh,
Of slumbering with the dead to-morrow
In the cold deep,
Where pleasure's throb or tears of sor-

row

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ODES TO NEA.

WRITTEN AT BERMUDA.

ΝΕΑ ΤΥΡΑΝΝΕΙ.

Euripid. Medea, v. 967. NAY, tempt me not to love again : There was a time when love was sweet;

Dear Nea! had I known thee then,

Our souls had not been slow to meet ! But, oh! this weary heart hath run

So many a time the rounds of pain, Not even for thee, thou lovely one!

Would I endure such pangs again.

If there be climes where never yet
The print of Beauty's foot was set,
Where man may pass his loveless
nights

Unfevered by her false delights—
Thither my wounded soul would fly,
Where rosy cheek or radiant eye
Should bring no more their bliss, their
pain,

Or fetter me to earth again!
Dear absent girl! whose eyes of light,
Though little prized when all my

own,

Now float before me, soft and bright

As when they first enamouring shone
How many hours of idle waste,
Within those witching arms embraced,
Unmindful of the fleeting day,
Have I dissolved life's dream away!
O bloom of time profusely shed!
O moments! simply, vainly fled,

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Tale iter omne cave.
Propert. lib. iv. eleg. 8.
I PRAY you, let us roam no more
Along that wild and lonely shore,
Where late we thoughtless strayed;
Twas not for us, whom Heaven in-
tends

To be no more than simple friends,
Such lonely walks were made.

That little bay where, winding in
From Ocean's rude and angry din
(As lovers steal to bliss),

The billows kiss the shore, and then
Flow calmly to the deep again,
As though they did not kiss!

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And saw the vestal planet weep

Her tears of light on Ariel's flood. My heart was full of Fancy's dream, Entangling in its net of smiles And as I watched the playful stream, So fair a group of elfin isles, I felt as if the scenery there

Were lighted by a Grecian skyAs if I breathed the blissful air That yet was warm with Sappho's sigh!

And now the downy hand of rest
Her signet on my eyes imprest,
And still the bright and balmy spell,
Like star-dew, o'er my fancy fell!
I thought that, all enrapt, I strayed
Through that serene luxurious shade,1
Where Epicurus taught the Loves

To polish Virtue's native brightness, Just as the beak of playful doves

Can give to pearls a smoother white. ness !2

'Twas one of those delicious nights

So common in the climes of Greece, When day withdraws but half its lights,

And all is moonshine, balm, and peace!

And thou wert there, my own beloved! And dearly by thy side I roved Through many a temple's reverend gloom,

And many a bower's seductive bloom, Where beauty blushed and wisdom taught,

Where lovers sighed and sages thought, Where hearts might feel or heads dis

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Where all that bard has ever dreamed

Of love or luxury bloomed around!
Oh! 'twas a bright bewildering scene-
Along the alley's deepening green,
Soft lamps, that hung like burning
flowers,

And scented and illumed the bowers,
Seemed, as to him, who darkling roves
Amid the lone Hercynian groves,
Appear the countless birds of light
That sparkle in the leaves at night,
And from their wings diffuse a ray
Along the traveller's weary way!
"Twas light of that mysterious kind,
Through which the soul is doomed

to roam

When it has left this world behind,

And gone to seek its heavenly home! And, Nea, thou didst look and move, Like any blooming soul of bliss, That wanders to its home above

Through mild and shadowy light like this!

But now, methought, we stole along Through halls of more voluptuous glory

Than ever lived in Teian song,

Or wantoned in Milesian story!1 And nymph were there, whose very eyes Seemed almost to exhale in sighs; Whose every little ringlet thrilled, As if with soul and passion filled! Some flew, with amber cups, around, Shedding the flowery wines of Crete, And, as they passed with youthful bound,

The onyx shone beneath their feet !3

The Milesiacs, or Milesian fables, had their origin in Miletus, a luxurious town of Ionia. Aristides was the most celebrated author of these licentious fictions. See Plutarch (in Crasso), who calls them ακολαστα βιβλία.

'Some of the Cretan wines, which Athenæus calls ovos avboσuias, from their fragrancy resembling that of the finest flowers.'-Barry on Wines, chap. vii.

It appears that, in very splendid mansions, the floor or pavement was frequently of onyx. Thus Martial: Calcatusque tuo sub pede lucet onyx.'-Epig. 50, lib. xii.

• Bracelets of this shape were a favourite ornament among the omen of antiquity. Oi emiкapmioι ορεις και αἱ χρυσαι πεδαι Θαιδος και Αρισταγόρας και Λαίδος φαρμακα, Philostrat. epis. xl. Lucian, too, tells of the Spaxioiσi ôpakovтes.

While others, waving arms of snow Entwined by snakes of burnished gold,4

And showing limbs, as loth to sh

Through many a thin Tarentia foll. Glided along the festal ring

With vases, all respiring spring, Where roses lay, in languor breathing, And the young bee grape, round them wreathing,

Hung on their blushes warm and meek, Like curls upon a rosy cheek!

Oh, Nea! why did morning break

The spell that so divinely bound me? Why did I wake? how could I wake, With thee my own and Heaven around me!

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See his Amores, where he describes the dressingroom of a Grecian lady, and we find the silver vase,' the rouge, the tooth-powder, and all the mystic order of a modern toilet.

The inhabitants pronounce the name as if it were written Bermooda. See the commentators on the words 'still-vexed Bermoothes,' in the Tempest.-I wonder it did not occur to some of those all-reading gentlemen, that possibly the discoverer of this 'island of hogs and devils' might have been no less a personage than the great John Bermudez, who about the same period (the beginning of the sixteenth century)

was sent Patriarch of the Latin Church to Ethiopia, and has left us most wonderful stories of the Amazons and the Griffins which he encountered.-Travels of the Jesuits, vol. i. I am afraid, however, it would take the Patriarch rather too much out of his way.

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