bor and drudgery, in hopes, at the end of their hard campaign, to be able to carry home wherewithal to pay their tythes, their taxes and their rent.

We met some sailors also, who had been with a whaler to London. It was a ship that had been three years on a South Sea voyage. The hands were all impressed in sight of their native land, where they had hoped, perhaps, to pour their hard-earned wages into the lap of a joyful wife; might they not, like me, have children, whose innocent smiles were their delight? Had they not human feelings? And though their hands were hard with labor, their hearts might be more tender than those they were to serve. Where is human justice to be found? These unhappy men were not even suspected, and yet their punishment was worse than that of malefactors.

I lived, as I said, near a fortnight in Falmouth, waiting for the packet. Lord Spencer, the easier to get rid of me, had sent me at the government expense; and I had received a letter, informing me from him, that my conveyance to America was to be defrayed. I therefore had made no provision. But finding that neither the packet agent nor the collector, Mr. Pelew, to whom I was consigned, had any orders, I thought it necessary to write on that head. And as I had come into England with views of peace, so I was determined to leave it. I made up my mind to see every thing in the fairest light, and to avoid every sentiment of resentment that could at best serve to ruffle my own mind and injure my health and happiness. I persuaded myself that lord Spencer had not meant unkindly; and at all events I owed him the same gratitude that the crane owed to the fox, who had his head in his mouth and did not bite it off: I therefore mentioned to him, that al

though I could not conceive why the government should have thought it necessary to proceed so harshly, yet that I was sensible of the handsome manner in which I had been so far conveyed, and hoped it would continue to the end of my voyage. I shall presently state to you with

candor, how far it did and how far it did not.

I was so far indulged during my stay in Falmouth, as to be allowed to walk with my conductor through the fields, along the rocks, or wherever fancy led. And besides that, the inhabitants of this little town had a certain character of benevolence, that it is remarkable for the simple rustic beauty of its women, there was a circumstance which gave it still more interest in my imagination; for nearly twenty years ago, when full of the ardor of youth, I was proceeding on my first voyage to America, by invitation of my uncle, colonel Sampson, to inherit a pretty rich estate which he possessed in that county of North-Carolina, which still bears his name, and was put, by adverse winds, into this very port. During several weeks that I was detained, my delight had been to explore the wild beauties of the country. It was in one of my excursions through the same grounds that my imagination, comparing the present with the past, seemed to have caught its former tone of youth, and I meditated a few Stanzas, which I committed with my pencil to writing, as opportunity served. I say the tone of youth, because such trifling belongs only of right to that season of life. And whatever little talent I might once have had for versifying, I have since my maturer years, considered the twisting of words as a frivolous pastime. But every thing was now legitimate that could amuse or dissipate.

HOPE AND THE EXILE.

A VISION.

IN the far verge of Britain's isle,
Captive, on a rocky steep,

I laid me down, and mus'd the while,
Gazing o'er the silent deep.

Behind me lay that Iron land,

Where tyrants hold their gloomy sway; Oppos'd was Gallia's glittering strand, Where despots smile, and slaves look gay.

Westward stretch'd the wat❜ry waste,
That washes the Columbian shore;

And there, an emerald enchas'd

That isle I'm doom'd to see no more.

Farewell, ye scenes of smiling youth,
Where memory delights to rove;
Farewell, ye friends, allied by truth,
By worth, by honor, to my love.

With winds of air, the ardent steed
Darts from the goal-is lost to sight;

More rapid is the arrow's speed,

That can arrest the lapwing's flight.

Swifter is sound to wound the ear;

Yet where the angry bullet flies, Long e'er the slow report draws near, Fate's work is sped-the victim dies.

But courser, arrow from the bow,

The unseen ball, nor beam of light, Shot from the star of day, can go

So quick as magic FANCY's flight.

The winds their hollow caverns rend,
The swelling waters burst their bounds;
And fire for freedom will contend

Against the weight of earthly mounds.

Yet all these elements combin'd

To rack the globe, have no such force,
As the free quality of MIND,
From corp❜ral bondage to divorce.

And I, in momentary trance,

With fancy's raptur'd eye could see

More in the compass of one glance,

Than in whole years when I was free.

For all at once, before mine eye,
A fancy form there did appear;
But whether issuing from the sky,
The earth, or sea, it was not clear.

With graceful step I saw her move;

I felt her charms my heart beguile; Soft as the breathing lute of love

Her voice; like the young morn her smile.

"Twas not that smile of venom'd dart,
Whose power above all soft controul,
Still wounds most deep the tenderest heart,
And kindles trouble in the soul.

She was not love and beauty's queen,
But sister like, so fair, so bright;
Less fire might in her eyes be seen,
But nothing less of beamy light.

Those Seraph eyes she fix'd on mine,

As she would read them thro' and thro'; Yet was their aspect so benign,

That I could dwell upon their view.

Is hopeless love, she said, thy care,
That here all silent and alone,
Thou seem'st to woo the vagrant air,
And to th' unpitying waters moan?

Or by the ruthless hand of fate,

Some friend or kindred hast thou lost,

Or been by destiny of late,

In fortune, or in honor, cross'd?

Those days, bright nymph! are past and gone
When I with love's hot flame did burn;
Long I have love's soft empire known,
But happy love, and kind return.

And friends and kindred tho' I've lost,
Whom my sad heart must ever mourn;
Yet not for them, nor fortunes cross'd,
Here am I silent and forlorn.

Gg