THE INFANT HERCULES AND THE SERPENTS. 195

The hilt he grasp'd in one hand, and the sheath
In t'other; and drew forth the blade of death.

All in an instant, like a stroke of doom, Returning midnight smote upon the room.

Amphitryon call'd; and woke from heavy sleep His household, who lay breathing hard and deep; "Bring lights here from the hearth! lights, lights; and guard

The doorways; rise, ye ready labourers hard!"

He said; and lights came pouring in, and all The busy house was up, in bower and hall; But when they saw the little suckling, how He grasp'd the monsters, and with earnest brow Kept beating them together, plaything-wise, They shriek'd aloud; but he, with laughing eyes, Soon as he saw Amphitryon, leap'd and sprung Childlike, and at his feet the dead disturbers flung.

Then did Alcmena to her bosom take

Her feebler boy, who could not cease to shake.
The other son Amphitryon took and laid
Beneath a fleece; and so return'd to bed.

;

Soon as the cock with his thrice-echoing cheer Told that the gladness of the day was near, Alcmena sent for old, truth-uttering Tiresias; and she told him all this thing, And bade him say what she might think and do "Nor do thou fear," said she, "to let me know, Although the mighty gods should meditate Aught ill; for man can never fly from Fate. And thus thou seest" (and here her smiling eyes Look'd through a blush) "how well I teach the wise."

So spoke the queen. Then he, with glad old tone; "Be of good heart, thou blessed bearing one, True blood of Perseus; for by my sweet sight, Which once divided these poor lids with light, Many Greek women, as they sit and weave The gentle thread across their knees at eve, Shall sing of thee and thy beloved name; Thou shalt be blest by every Argive dame : For unto this thy son it shall be given

With his broad heart to win his way to heaven; Twelve labours shall he work; and all accurst And brutal things o'erthrow, brute men the worst ; And in Trachinia shall the funeral pyre

Purge his mortalities away with fire,

And he shall mount amid the stars, and be
Acknowledg'd kin to those who envied thee,
And sent these den-born shapes to crush his
destiny."

GREEK PRETENDERS TO PHILOSOPHY

DESCRIBED.

FROM THE ANTHOLOGY.

(The original is in similar compound words.)

LOFTY-brow-flourishers,

Nose-in-beard-wallowers,

Bag-and-beard-nourishers,

Dish-and-all-swallowers;

Old-cloak-investitors,

Barefoot-lookfashioners,
Night-private-feasteaters,
Craft-lucubrationers;

Youth-cheaters, word-catchers, vaingloryosophers,
Such are such seekers of virtue, philosophers.

CUPID SWALLOWED!

A PARAPHRASE FROM THE SAME.

T'OTHER day as I was twining
Roses, for a crown to dine in,
What, of all things, 'midst the heap
Should I light on, fast asleep,
But the little desperate elf,
The tiny traitor, Love himself!
By the wings I pinch'd him up
Like a bee, and in a cup

Of my wine I plung'd and sank him,
And what d' ye think I did?—I drank him.
'Faith, I thought him dead. Not he!
There he lives with tenfold glee;
And now this moment with his wings
I feel him tickling my heart-strings.

CATULLUS'S RETURN HOME

TO THE PENINSULA OF SIRMIO.

O BEST of all the scatter'd spots that lie
In sea or lake,-apple of landscape's eye,-
How gladly do I drop within thy nest,
With what a sight of full, contented rest,
Scarce able to believe my journey o'er,
And that these eyes behold thee safe once more!

Oh where's the luxury like the smile at heart, When the mind, breathing, lays its load apart,When we come home again, tir'd out, and spread The loosen'd limbs o'er all the wish'd-for bed! This, this alone is worth an age of toil.

Hail, lovely Sirmio! Hail, paternal soil!

Joy, my bright waters, joy; your master's come! Laugh, every dimple on the cheek of home!

SONG OF FAIRIES ROBBING AN ORCHARD.

FROM SOME LATIN VERSES IN THE OLD ENGLISH DRAMA OF "AMYNTAS, OR THE IMPOSSIBLE DOWRT,"

WE the Fairies, blithe and antic,
Of dimensions not gigantic,

Though the moonshine mostly keep us,
Oft in orchards frisk and peep us.

Stolen sweets are always sweeter,
Stolen kisses much completer,
Stolen looks are nice in chapels,
Stolen, stolen be your apples.

When to bed the world are bobbing,
Then's the time for orchard robbing;
Yet the fruit were scarce worth peeling
Were it not for stealing, stealing.

THE JOVIAL PRIEST'S CONFESSION.

THERE is already an imitation by Mr. Huddesford of the following reverend piece of wit; and one of the passages in it beats any thing in the present version. It is the beginning of the last stanza,—

Mysterious and prophetic truths

I never could unfold 'em,
Without a flagon of good wine,
And a slice of cold ham.

The translation here offered to the reader is intended to be a more literal picture of the original, and to retain more of its intermixture of a grave and churchman-like style. The original is preserved in the Remains of the learned Camden, who says, in his pleasant way, that "Walter de Mapes, Archdeacon of Oxford, who, in the time of King Henry the Second, filled England with his merriments, confessed his love to good liquor in this manner:"

I DEVISE to end my days—in a tavern drinking; May some Christian hold for me-the glass when I am shrinking; [sinking, That the Cherubim may cry-when they see me God be merciful to a soul-of this gentleman's way of thinking.

A glass of wine amazingly-enlighteneth one's internals; [supernals;

'Tis wings bedewed with nectar-that fly up to Bottles cracked in taverns-have much the sweeter kernels,

Than the sups allowed to us-in the college journals.

Every one by nature hath—a mould which he was cast in ; [fasting; I happen to be one of those who never could write