› Amazement all! my grief to filence charm'd, Is loft in wonder. But, thou good unknown! If woes for ever wedded to despair;

• That wish no cure, are thine, behold in me

A meet companion: one whom earth and Heav'n
Combine to curfe; whom never future morn
Shall light to joy, nor ev'ning with repofe
Defcending fhade-O, fon of this wild world!
From focial converfe tho' for ever barr'd,
• Tho' chill'd with endless winter from the pole,
Yet warm'd by goodnefs, form'd to tender sense

⚫ of human woes beyond what milder climes,
By fairer funs attemper'd, courtly boaft;
O fay, did e'er thy breaft, in youthful life,
Touch'd by a beam from beauty all-divine,
• Did e'er thy bosom her sweet influence own,
In pleafing tumult pour'd thro' ev'ry vein,
And panting at the heart, when first our eye
Receives impreffion? then, as paffion grew,
Did Heav'n, confenting to thy wish, indulge

That blifs no wealth can bribe, no pow'r bestow,
That blifs of angels, love by love repaid?

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Heart ftreaming full to heart in mutual flow

‹ Of faith and friendship, tenderness and truth!—

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If these thy fate diftinguish'd, thou wilt then,

My joys conceiving, image my despair,
How total! how extreme! for this, all this,
Late my fair fortune, wreck'd on yonder flood,
Lies loft and bury'd there!-O, awful Heav'n!
Who to the wind and to the whelming wave
Her blameless head devoted, thou alone

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Canft tell what I have loft !-O, ill-ftarr'd maid!

O, moft undone Amyntor!'-Sighs and tears,
And heart-heav'd groans, at this his voice fupprefs'd:
The reft was agony and dumb despair.

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Now o'er their heads damp night her ftormy gloom

Spread,

Spread, ere the glimm'ring twilight was expir'd,

With huge and heavy horror clofing round

In doubling clouds on clouds. The mournful fcene,
The moving tale, Aurelius deeply felt;

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And thus reply'd, as one in nature skill'd,

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With foft-affenting forrow in his look,

And words to foothe, not combat hopeless love.

Amyntor! by that Heav'n who fees thy tears,
By faith and friendship's fympathy divine,

• Could I the forrows heal I more than fhare,
This bofom, truft me, fhould from thine transfer
It's fharpeft grief. Such grief, alas! how juft!
How long in filent anguish to defcend,

• When reason and when fondness o'er the tomb
Are fellow-mourners! He who can refign,

Has never lov'd; and wert thou to the fenfe,

The facred feeling of a lofs like thine,

• Cold and infenfible, thy breast were then No manfion for humanity, or thought

• Of noble aim. Their dwelling is with love
And tender pity, whose kind tear adorns
The clouded cheek, and fanctifies the foul
They foften, not fubdue. We both will mix,
For her thy virtue lov'd, thy truth laments,
• Our focial fighs; and, ftill as morn unveils
The bright'ning hill, or ev'ning's misty shade
It's brow obfcures, her gracefulness of form,
Her mind all lovely, each ennobling each,
• Shall be our frequent theme: then fhalt thou hear
From me, in fad return, a tale of woes

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So terrible-Amyntor, thy pain'd heart,
Amid it's own, will fhudder at the ills

That mine has bled with !-But, behold! the dark

And drowsy hour steals faft upon our talk:

Here break we off; and thou, fad mourner! try

Thy weary limbs, thy wounded mind, to balm

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• With

• With timely fleep: each gracious wing from heav'n, • Of those that minister to erring man,

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Near-hov'ring, hufh thy paffions into calm;
Serene thy flumbers with prefented scenes
Of brightest vifion; whifper to thy heart
That holy peace which goodness ever shares;
And to us both be friendly as we need!'

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NOW

CANTO II.

OW midnight rofe, and o'er the gen'ral fcene,
Air, ocean, earth, drew broad her blackest veil,
Vapour and cloud. Around th' unsleeping isle
Yet howl'd the whirlwind, yet the billow groan'd,
And in mix'd horror to Amyntor's ear

Borne thro' the gloom, his fhrinking fenfe appall'd.
Shook by each blaft, and fwept by ev'ry wave,

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Again pale mem'ry labours in the storm;

Again from her is torn whom more than life

His fondness lov'd. And now another show'r

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Of forrow o'er the dear unhappy maid
Effufive ftream'd, till late, thro' ev'ry pow'r
The foul fubdu'd funk fad to flow repofe;
And all her dark'ning scenes, by dim degrees,

Were quench'd in total night: a paufe from pain
Not long to laft; for Fancy, oft awake
While Reason fleeps, from her illufive cell
Call'd up wild fhapes of vifionary fear,
Of vifionary blifs, the hour of reft

To mock with mimick fhews.

And, lo! the deeps

In airy tumult fwell: beneath a hill

Amyntor heaves off overwhelming feas,

Or rides, with dizzy dread, from cloud to cloud,
The billow's back: anon, the fhadowy world

Shifts to fome boundless continent unknown,

Where folitary, o'er the ftarless void,

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Dumb

Dumb Silence broods. Thro' heaths of dreary length,
Slow on he drags his ftagg'ring ftep infirm

With breathlefs toil; hears torrent floods afar

Roar thro' the wild; and, plung'd in central caves,
Falls headlong many a fathom into night.

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Yet there, at once, in all her living charms,,

And bright'ning with their glow the brown abyss,
Rofe Theodora. Smiling, in her eye

Sate, without cloud, the foft-confenting foul,
That, guilt unknowing, had no wish to hide;
A spring of fudden myrtles flow'ring round
Their walk embower'd; while nightingales beneath
Sung fpoufals, as along th' enamell'd turf
They feem'd to fly, and interchang'd their fouls,
Melting in mutual foftness. Thrice his arms
The fair encircled; thrice fhe fled his grafp,

And fading into darkness mix'd with air

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O, turn! O, ftay thy flight!'-fo loud he cry'd,

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Sleep and it's train of humid vapours fled.

He groan'd, he gaz'd around; his inward fenfe

Yet glowing with the vision's vivid beam,
Still on his eye the hov'ring fhadow blaz'd;
Her voice ftill murmur'd in his tinkling ear,
Grateful deception! till returning thought
Left broad awake, amid th' incumbent lour
Of mute and mournful night, again he felt
His grief inflam'd throb fresh in ev'ry vein.
To frenzy ftung, upstarting from his couch,

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The vale, the shore, with darkling step he roam'd,

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Like fome drear spectre from the grave unbound;

Then scaling yonder cliff, prone o'er it's brow

He hung, in act to plunge amid the flood,

Scarce from that height difcern'd. Nor Reafon's voice,

Nor ow'd fubmiffion to the will of Heav'n,

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Restrains him; but as paffion whirls his thought,
Fond expectation, that perchance escap'd,

Tho'

Tho' paffing all belief, the frailer skiff,

To which himself had borne th' unhappy fair,
May yet be seen. Around o'er fea and fhore
He roll'd his ardent eye, but nought around
On land or wave within his ken appears,
Nor skiff, nor floating corfe, on which to shed
The last fad tear, and lay the cov'ring mold!

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And now, wide open'd by the wakeful hours Heav'n's orient gate, forth on her progress comes Aurora fmiling, and her purple lamp

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Lifts high o'er earth and fea; while, all unveil'd,
The vast horizon on Amyntor's eye

Pours full it's fcenes of wonder, wildly great,
Magnificently various. From this steep
Diffus'd immenfe, in rolling prospect lay

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The northern deep: amidft, from space to space,
Her num'rous ifles, rich gems of Albion's crown,

As flow th' afcending mists disperse in air,
Shoot gradual from her bofom; and beyond,
Like distant clouds blue-floating on the verge
Of ev'ning fkies, break forth the dawning hills.
A thousand landscapes, barren fome and bare,
Rock pil'd on rock, amazing, up to heav'n,
Of horrid grandeur: fome with founding ash,
Or oak broad fhadowing, or the spiry growth
Of waving pine high-plum'd; and all beheld
More lovely in the fun's adorning beam,
Who now, fair rifing o'er yon eastern cliff,
The vernal verdure tinctures gay with gold.
Meanwhile Aurelius, wak'd from sweet repose,
Repose that Temp'rance fheds in timely dews
On all who live to her, his mournful guest
Came forth to hail, as hofpitable rites
And virtue's rule enjoin; but first to Him,
Spring of all charity, who gave the heart
With kindly fenfe to glow, his matin fong,

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