As still was her look, and as still was her ee,

As the stillness that lay on the emerant lea,

Or the mist that sleeps on a waveless

sea.

For Kilmeny had been she knew not where,

And Kilmeny had seen what she could not declare;

Kilmeny had been where the cock never crew,

Where the rain never fell, and the wind never blew;

But it seemed as the harp of the sky had rung,

And the airs of heaven played round her tongue,

When she spake of the lovely forms she had seen,

And a land where sin had never been

A land of love and a land of light, Withouten sun, or moon, or night; And lovely beings round were rife, Who erst had travelled mortal life; They clasped her waist and her hands sae fair,

They kissed her cheek and they kemed her hair;

And round came many a blooming fere,

Saying, " Bonny Kilmeny, ye're wel

come here!

Then Kilmeny begged again to see The friends she had left in her own countrye;

With distant music soft and deep, They lulled Kilmeny sound asleep; And when she awakened, she lay her lane,

All lapped with flowers in the greenwood wene.

When seven long years had come and fled;

When grief was calm, and hope was dead;

When scarce was remembered Kilmeny's name,

Late, late in a gloamin, Kilmeny came hame!

And oh, her beauty was fair to see, But still and steadfast was her ee! And oh, the words that fell from her mouth

Were words of wonder and words of truth!

Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,

Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are: Sometimes she gallops o'er a courtier's nose,

And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;

And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig's tail,

Tickling a parson's nose as he lies asleep,

Then dreams he of another benefice:

Sometimes she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,

And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,

Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,

Of healths five fathom deep; and then anon

Drums in his ear, at which he starts, and wakes,

And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two,

And sleeps again. This is that very Mab

That plaits the manes of horses in the night,

And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs,

Which once untangled, much misfortune bodes.

SHAKSPEARE: Romeo and Juliet.

SONG FROM GYPSIES' METAMORPHOSES.

THE Owl is abroad, the bat, the toad,

And so is the cat-a-mountain; The ant and the mole sit both in a hole;

And frog peeps out o' the fountain; The dogs they bay, and the timbrels play;

The spindle now is a-turning; The moon it is red, and the stars are fled;

But all the sky is a-burning.

THE faery beam upon you, And the stars to glister on you, A moon of light

In the noon of night,