A LAWYER'S FAREWELL TO HIS

MUSE.

AS, by some tyrant's stern command,

A wretch forsakes his native land, In foreign climes condemned to roam An endless exile from his home, Pensive he treads the destined way, And dreads to go, nor dares to stay, Till on some neighboring mountain's brow He stops and turns his eyes below, There, melting at the well-known view, Drops a last tear and bids adieu,So I, thus doomed from thee to part, Gay queen of fancy and of art, Reluctant move with doubtful mind, Oft stop and often look behind.

Diseases taint the murky air,

And midnight conflagrations glare;
Loose revelry and riot bold
In frighted streets their orgies hold,
Or where in silence all is drowned
Fell Murder walks his lonely round;
No room for peace, no room for you,
Adieu, celestial nymph, adieu!

Shakespeare, no more thy sylvan son, Nor all the art of Addison,

Pope's heaven-strung lyre, nor Waller's

ease,

Nor Milton's mighty self, must please:
Instead of these, a formal band

In furs and coifs around me stand;
With sounds uncouth and accents dry,
That grate the soul of harmony,
Each pedant sage unlocks his store
Of mystic, dark, discordant lore,
And points with tottering hand the ways
That lead me to the thorny maze.
There, in a winding close retreat,
Is Justice doomed to fix her seat;
There, fenced by bulwarks of the law,
She keeps the wondering world in awe;
And there, from vulgar sight retired
Like Eastern queen, is more admired.

Oh let me pierce the secret shade
Where dwells the venerable maid,
There humbly mark, with reverend awe,
The guardian of Britannia's law;
Unfold with joy her sacred page-
The united boast of many an age-
Where, mixed yet uniform, appears
The wisdom of a thousand years.
In that pure spring the bottom view,
Clear, deep and regularly true,

And other doctrines thence imbibe
Than lurk within the sordid scribe;
Observe how parts with parts unite
In one harmonious rule of right;
See countless wheels distinctly tend
By various laws to one great end;
While mighty Alfred's piercing soul
Pervades and regulates the whole.
Then welcome business, welcome strife,
Welcome the cares, the thorns, of life,
The visage wan, the pore-blind sight,
The toil by day, the lamp at night,
The tedious forms, the solemn prate,
The pert dispute, the dull debate,
The drowsy bench, the babbling hall,
For thee, fair Justice, welcome all!

Thus, though my noon of life be past,
Yet let my setting sun at last
Find out the still, the rural cell
Where sage Retirement loves to dwell:
There let me taste the homefelt bliss
Of innocence and inward peace.
Untainted by the guilty bribe,
Uncursed amid the harpy tribe,
No orphan's cry to wound my ear,
My honor and my conscience clear,
Thus may I calmly meet my end,
Thus to the grave in peace descend.

I wore my bridal robe,
And I rivalled its whiteness
Bright gems were in my
hair:
How I hated their brightness!
He called me by my name

As the bride of another.
Oh, thou hast been the cause
Of this anguish, my mother!
And once again we met,

And a fair girl was near him;
He smiled and whispered low,
As I once used to hear him.
She leant upon his arm:

Once 'twas mine, and mine only;

I wept, for I deserved

To feel wretched and lonely.

And all the bells. are ringing round-
One, two, three, four and five-

I at my study-window sit,
And, wrapped in many a musing fit,
To bliss am all alive.

But, though impressions calm and sweet
Thrill round my heart a holy heat
And I am inly glad,

The teardrop stands in either eye,

suit :

She sowed the seeds, but Death has reaped

the fruit.

'Twas thine own genius gave the final blow, And helped to plant the wound that laid thee low.

So the struck eagle, stretched upon the plain,

No more through rolling clouds to soar again,

Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart, And winged the shaft that quivered in his heart.

Keen were his pangs, but keener far to feel He nursed the pinion which impelled the steel,

While the same plumage that had warmed his nest

I am pleased, and yet I'm sad. The silvery rack that flies away Like mortal life or pleasure's ray

Does that disturb my breast? Nay! what have I, a studious man, To do with life's unstable plan

Or pleasure's fading vest?

Is it that here I must not stop,
But o'er blue hill's woody top

yon

Must bend my lonely way? No-surely no! for give but me My own fireside, and I shall be

At home where'er I stray. Then is it that yon steeple there

With music sweet shall fill the air

When thou no more canst hear? Oh no! oh no! for then, forgiven,

breast.

LORD BYRON.

*Henry Kirke White died at Cambridge in October, 1806, in consequence of too much exertion in the pursuit

of studies that would have matured a mind which disease and poverty could not impair, and which death itself destroyed rather than subdued. His poems abound in such

Released from every fear. Then whence it is I cannot tell, But there is some mysterious spell

That holds me when I'm glad; And so the teardrop fills my eye,

assume.

Or wherefore I am sad.

HENRY KIRKE WHITE.

The vain fictitious glitter of the crown,

As toward his home in Israel's sheltered vales A stately rabbi drew. His camels spied Afar the palm trees' lofty heads that decked The dear domestic fountain, and in speed Pressed with broad foot the smooth and dewy glade.

The holy man his peaceful threshold passed With hasting step. The evening meal was spread,

And she who from life's morn his heart had shared

The splendors of their own sublime renown.

Thus woman needeth not the crown's poor pride:

the board,