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POETRY.

[We have been favored with the manuscript of the following very beau tiful pieces of Mrs. Barbauld and Miss Aikin, with the permission te publish them.]

ON THE KING'S ILLNESS BY MRS. BARBAULD.

REST, rest, afflicted spirit, quickly pass

Thine hour of bitter suffering. Rest await thee
There where the load of weary life laid down,
The peasant and the king repose together.
Thus peaceful sleep; thy quiet grave bedewed
With tears of those that loved thee. Not for thee
In the dark chamber of the nether world,
Shall spectre kings arise from burning thrones,
And point the vacant seat, and scoffing say,

Art thou become like us? Oh, not for thee!
For thou hadst human feelings, and hast walked
A man with man; and kindly charities,
Even such as warm the cottage hearth, were thine;
And therefore falls the tear from eyes not used

To gaze on kings with admiration fond.

And thou hast knelt at meek religion's shrine

With no mock homage, and hast owned her rights
Sacred in every breast; and therefore rise
Affectionate for thee, the orisons,

And midnight prayer alike from vaulted domes,
Whence the loud organ peals, and raftered roofs
Of humbler worship: still remembering this,
A nation's pity and a nation's love

Linger beside thy couch, in this the day

Of thy sad visitation, veiling faults

Of erring judgment, and not will perverse.

Yet oh! that thou hadst closed the wounds of war!

That had been praise to suit a higher strain.
Farewell! thy years roll down the gulph of time;
Thy name has chronicled a long, bright page
Of England's glory; and perhaps the babe,
Who opens, as thou closest thine, his eye

On this eventful world, when aged grown,
Musing on times gone by, shall sigh and say,
Shaking his thin grey hairs, whitened with grief,
Our fathers' days were happy.' Fare thee well,
My thread of life has even run with thine
For many a lustre, and thy closing day
I contemplate, not mindless of my own,
Nor to its call reluctant.

1

T

THE BALLOON-BY MISS AIKIN.

HE airy ship at anchor rides;

Proudly she heaves her painted sides,
Impatient of delay;

And now her silken form expands,
She springs aloft, she bursts her bands,
She floats upon her way.

How swift! for now I see her sail

High mounted on the viewless gale,
And speeding up the sky;

And now a speck in ether tost,

A moment seen, a moment lost,

She cheats my dazzled eye.

Bright wonder! thee no flapping wing,
No laboring oar, no bounding spring
Urged on thy fleet career.

By native buoyancy impelled,

Thy easy flight was smoothly held,
Along the silent sphere.

No curling mist at close of light,
No meteor on the breast of night,
No cloud at breezy dawn,

No leaf adown the summer's tide
More effortless is seen to glide,
Or shadow o'er the lawn.

Yet thee, even thee, the destined hour
Shall summon from thy airy tour,

Rapid in prone descent.

'Methinks I see thee downward borne,
With flaccid sides that droop forlorn,
Thy breath ethereal spent.

Thus daring fancy's plumes sublime,

Thus love's bright wings are clipped by time;
Thus hope, her soul elate

Exhales amid this grosser air;

Thus lightest hearts are bowed by care,

And genius yields to fate.

STILL

For the Repository.

TO A CHILD.

are wild fancy's flattering dreams believed?

So fondly trusting, yet so oft deceived?

Mysterious mistress of th' enthusiast's heart;

His bliss, his pride-his chalice, and his smart!

How hate thee, source whence purest pleasures flow?
How love thee, poisoner of the shafts of woe?
Thou faithless sorceress-thou bewitching fair;

Thou child of hope-thou nursling of despair!

Now the fierce lightning is thy Proteus form,
Now the bright arch, that triumphs o'er the storm.
Such, Fancy, is thy varied good and ill;

Yet, dear enchantress, I must love the still.

'Tis sweet to view, in childhood's earliest dawn,
The first faint streaks that gild the rising morn.
Thou wav'st thy wand-no more the veil appears,
That hides from present gaze the future years;
We snatch bright virtues from the days to come,
And weave the laurels, that may never bloom.

Dear boy! I love to watch thine infant face,
Ere time imprint the lines thy passions trace:
By turns, I mark the gentle virtues speak,
Play round thy mouth, and dimple on thy cheek;
And read the spirit in thy sparkling eye,
That scorns to flatter, and that fears to lie.
Whate'er the fates that wait on thy career,
We cannot know them, and we ought not fear:
We cannot read them with prophetic eye;
We cannot guess them from the days gone by.
Fair are the hopes thine opening dawn inspires,
And add new brilliancy to fancy's fires:
Yet rude the storms that threat life's clearest sky,
And hope smiles sweetest ere her visions die.

But oh! to thee be those kind feelings given,
Whose fruit is virtue, whose reward is heaven:
Thine be the glowing heart, the constant mind,
"Obedient passions, and a will resigned."
Oh, be in life all virtue's self can crave,
And many a tear fall sweetly on thy grave!

From Smyth's English Lyrics.

TO CHEERFULNESS.

THE hunter on the mountain's brow,
The rosy youth from study free,
Ne'er breathed, O Cheerfulness, a vow
More fond, than I have breathed to thee.
Yet sometimes, if in lonely hour
I quit thy loved, enchanting bower

By glooms of wayward fancy driven;
And from thee turn my languid eyes,
Nor longer deem thy pleasure wise;
Oh! be my suffering heart forgiven.

Not always can the varying mind

Bear to thy shrine an homage true; Some chains mysterious seem to bind, Some sullen sorcery to subdue;

Nor always can the scene be gay,

Nor blest the morrow as to day;

And musing thoughts will sadness bring;

Can time so near me hourly fly,

Nor I his passing form descry,

Nor ever hear his rustling wing?

E'en now I feel with vain regret
How soon these happy days must end;
Already seems my sun to set,

I mark the shades of eve descend;
The visto catch where sorrow grey
And weary pain are on their way;

Beyond, with startled glance I see
The billows dark, the fated shore,
The forms that sink and rise no more,
The ocean of eternity.

REVIEW.

Nec vero hæ sine sorte datæ, sine judice, sedes-Virg.

ARTICLE 1.

Situation of England in 1811, by M. Mie. de Montgaillard. Translated from the French by a citizen of the United States.

"We ought to be apprehensive, that the mad pretensions, the ty. ranny, and the cupidity of our ministers will one day open the eyes of all Europe. Let us enjoy with moderation our commercial prosperi ty, and not excite wars —If a great man should be seated on the throne of France, England would fall, and would be of no more importance than the island of Sardinia, for bankruptcy is at our doors."

Bolingbroke 1732. New York, printed by C. S. Van Winkle, No. 122, Water Street, 1812.

SUCH is the title-page of a work, which is introduced to the American reader, as the production of a French nobleman of talents, and great political information, and which the translator believes to contain "truths of a nature to excite the deepest concern in the mind of every American who feels an interest in the independence, the welfare, and the prosperity of his country."

That such ought to be the effect of this work upon the mind of every reflecting man, of every man who regards the independence of Great Britain, and her ability to resist theenormous power, and in creasing usurpations of France, as important to the whole civilized world, cannot be denied, if we assume with the translator, that this French writer has displayed to us momentous truths, has given us a just view of her finan

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