These are amongst the horrors, thou,
Dread Demon, heapest on my brow.

Reader! these are no fancied woes,
For could I to thy view disclose
The visions that torment my sight;
Each grinning elf, each grisly sprite,-
However strong thy nerves may be,
Thou wouldst not mock, but pity me.

Ah! see you not that monstrous birth
Engender'd by yon teeming hearth?
Mark that fantastic shapeless frame,
All head and legs, with eyes of flame!
My vision reels

*

*

*

Maddening, I to my window crawl,—

Alas, alas, discomfort all!

Rain, rain, eternal rain descending,
My weather-glass no change portending ;-
The black wet mass of yesterday

In loosening torrents drowns the May!
Oh, happy climate! beauteous Spring!
Last Winter was the self-same thing.

Why not at once give all the slip ?-
Yon sleepy portion tempts my lip:
The waning hour-glass seems to say,
"Thy sand, like mine, has drained away;"
And by the Death's head on the ground
Again my straining sight is bound.—
One glass suffices-shall I try,

And shift this clinging agony?—
Shall I

*

Here the desponding MS. from which these lines are copied abruptly breaks off; and we are left in doubt whether the wise suggestion of the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet was adopted by the writer

or not.

J. O.

SPLEEN.

CANKER of Life! beneath whose baneful The kind affections wither and decay,

sway

Whose torpid influence and whose dark control
Can "freeze the genial current of the soul;"
With self-inflicted fears the bosom's lord
In every dreaded semblance finds accord,
Shaping a horrid chaos on the brain,

To forms and colours of the darkest stain.-
Ah, wherefore had the tyrant-monster birth,
To blot the fairest prospects of the earth!
Veiling the richest treasures of the skies,-
Damping the sounds of pleasure as they rise,-
Stamping its horrid coinage on the thought,
Where the base image into vision's brought!
'Tis like a substance that we cannot hold;
Speaks like a legend-that may not be told :
Whose import's felt-imparted without breath—
Shades to the sight, but every shade a Death.

EDWARD.

THE HYPOCHONDRIAC.

A TALE.

BY AN EYE-WITNESS.

TOM WUNDERLICH was the son of Jacob Wunderlich, an honest sugar-baker, on Fish-Street Hill, who, having acquired an ample fortune in trade, was anxious to elevate his descendants, above the humble German stock from which he sprung, by marrying into some patrician family of his adopted country, to whom his wealth and interest in the city would make him acceptable. He fixed his choice upon the eldest daughter of Sir Roger Penny, a Baronet, of an ancient family, with much pride, two sons, eleven daughters, and twelve hundred a-year; but the match was not concluded without the stipulation that he would get himself previously knighted, a matter which, although at variance with his sugarbaking ideas, yet, he was convinced, was consistent with the object of his marriage; and, having accomplished it, he quickly transformed Miss Penny into Lady Wunderlich.

My lady gained some long-anticipated points by her marriage. She had acquired the same title as her mother, and, although the rank of her husband was inferior to that of her father, yet, his fortune turned the scale greatly in her favour. She had much at her command; and by her power of occasionally obliging the old lady in pecuniary matters, she obtained an ascendancy over her mamma which consoled her for deficiency of rank. Poor Wunderlich, on the contrary, found that he had spread his bed with nettles. His sugar-baking concern he willingly relinquished, as his fortune was ample; but to quit Lloyd's; his old cronies and city habits; to be forced to enter into the beau-monde; to pay and receive forenoon calls with my lady; attend evening parties, give at homes, balls, and suppers; and, to use his own expressions, "to have his house turned inside out," without daring to exclaim, "My Got, meine ladie! this will not do"-was too much for the worthy knight; whose chagrin, having brought on an attack of confirmed jaundice, terminated his disappointment and his life, a few months after the birth of our hero. Previous to his death, however, Sir Jacob had made a will, leaving a very moderate jointure only to Lady Wunderlich; and the reversion of his property to his son; failing whom it was