From The Sensitive Plant." A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew, And the young winds fed it with silver dew And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light, And closed them beneath the kisses of night, And the spring arose on the garden fair, And the spirit of love fell everywhere; And each flower and herb on earth's dark breast Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest. But none ever trembled and panted with bliss In the garden, the field, or the wilderness, Like a doe in the noontide with love's sweet want, As the companionless Sensitive Plant. The snowdrop, and then the violet, Arose froin the ground with warm rain wet, And their breath was mixed with fresh odour, sent From the turf, like the voice and the instrumento, Then the pied wind-flowers and the tulip tall, And narcissi, the fairest among them all, Who gaze on their eyes in the stream's recess, Till they die of their own dear loveliness ; And the Naiad-like lily of the vale, Whom youth makes so fair, and passion so pale, That the light of its tremulous bells is seen Through their pavilions of tender green; And the hyacinth purple, and white, and blue, Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew Of music so delicate, soft, and intense, It was felt like an odour within the sense; And the rose like a nymph to the bath addrest, Which unveiled the depth of her glowing breast, Till, fold after fold, to the fainting air The soul of her beauty and love lay bare; And the wand-like lily, which lifted up, As a Mænad, its moonlight-coloured cup, Till the fiery star, which is its eye, Gazed through clear dew on the tender sky; And the jessamine faint, and the sweet tuberose, The sweetest flower for scent that blows; And all rare blossoms from every clime, Grew in that garden in perfect prime. And on the stream whose inconstant bosom, Was prankt under boughs of embowering blossom, With gollen and green light, slanting through Their heaven of many a tangled hue, Broad water-lilies lay tremulously, And starry river-buds glimmered by, And around them the soft stream did glide and dance With a motion of sweet sound and radiance. And the sinuous paths of lawn and of moss, Which led through the garden along and across, Some open at once to the sun and the breeze, Some lost among bowers of blossoming trees,

Were all paved with daisies and delicate bells
As fair as the fabulous asphodels;
And flowrets which, drooping as day drooped too,
Fell into pavilions, white, purple, and blue,
To roof the glowworm from the evening dew.
And from this undefiled Paradise
The flowers--as an infant's awakening eyes
Smile on its mother, whose singing sweet
Can first lull, and at last must awaken it-
When heaven's blithe winds had unfolded them,
As mine-lamps enkindle a hi gem,
Shone smiling to heaven, and every one
Shared joy in the light of the gentle sun;
For each one was interpenetrated
With the light and the odour its neighbour shed,
Like young lovers whom youth and

love make dear,
Wrapt and filled by their mutual atmosphere.
But the Sensitive Plant, which could give small fruit
Of the love which it felt from the leaf to the root,
Received more than all, it loved more than ever,
Where none wanted but it, could belong to the giver;
For the Sensitive Plant has no bright flower;
Radiance and odour are not its dower :
It loves, even like Love, its deep heart is full,
It desires what it has not-the beautiful !
The light winds which, from unsustaining wings,
Shed the music of many murmurings;
The beams which dart from many a star
Of the flowers whose hues they bear afar;
The plumed insects swift and free,
Like golden boats on a sunny sea,
Laden with light and odour which pass
Over the gleam of the living grass ;
The unseen clouds of the dew, which lie
Like fire in the flowers till the sun rides high,
Then wander like spirits among the spheres,
Each cloud faint with the fragrance it bears,
The quivering vapours of dim noontide,
Which like a sea o'er the warm earth glide,
In which every sound, and odour, and beam,
Move as reeds in a single stream;
Each and all like ministering angels were
For the Sensitive Plant sweet joy to bear,
Whilst the lagging hours of the day went by,
Like windless clouds o'er a tender sky.
And when evening descended from heaven above,
And the earth was all rest, and the air was all love,
And delight, though less bright, was far more deep,
And the day's veil fell from the world of sleep,
And the beasts, and the birds, and the insects were drowned
In an ocean of dreams without a sound;
Whose waves never mark, though they ever impress
The light sand which paves it-consciousness.

(Only overhead the sweet nightingale
Ever sang more sweet as the day might fail,
And snatches of its Elysian chant
Were mixed with the dreams of the Sensitive Plant);
The Sensitive Plant was the earliest
Up-gathered into the bosom of rest;
A sweet child weary of its delight,
The feeblest, and yet the favourite,
Cradled within the embrace of night,

Forest Scenery. From Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude.'

The noonday sun
Now shone upon the forest, one vast mass
Of mingling shade, whose brown magnificence
A narrow vale embosoms. There huge caves,
Scooped in the dark base of those airy rocks,
Mocking its moans, respond and roar for ever.
The meeting boughs and implicated leaves
Wove twilight o'er the poet's path, as led
By love, or dream, or god, or mightier death,
He sought in nature's dearest haunt, some bank,
Her cradle and his sepulchre. More dark
And dark the shades accumulate—the oak,
Expanding its immense and knotty arms,
Embraces the light beech. The pyramids
Of the tall cedar overarching frame
Most solemn domes within, and far below,
Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky,
The ash and the acacia floating hang,
Tremulous and pale. Like restless serpents clothed
In rainbow and in fire, the parasites,
Starred with ten thousand blossoms, flow around
The gray trunks; and, as gamesome infants' eyes,
With gentle meanings and most innocent wiles,
Fold their beams round the hearts of those that love,
These twine their tendrils with the wedded boughs,
Uniting their close union; the woven leaves
Make network of the dark-blue light of day
And the nigbt's noontide clearness, mutable
As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft mossy lawns
Beneath these canopies extend their swells,
Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyes with blooms
Minute yet beautiful. One darkest gien
Sends from its woods of musk-rose, twined with jasmine,
A soul-dissolving odour, to invite
To some more lovely mystery. Through the dell
Silence and twilight here, twin sisters, keep,
Their noonday watch, and sail among the shades,
Like vapourous shapes half seen; beyond, a well,
Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent wave,
Images all the woven boughs above;
And each depending leaf, and every speck
Of azure sky, darting between their chasms;
Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves
Its portraiture, but some inconstant star
Between one foliaged lattice twinkling fair,
Or painted bird, sleeping beneath the moon,
Or gorgeous insect, floating motionless
Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings
Have spread their glories to the gaze of noon.

Stanzas written in Dejection, near Naples.
The sun is warm, the sky is clear,

The waves are dancing fast and bright,
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear

The purple noon's transparent light,
The breath of the moist air is light,

Around its unexpanded buds;
Like many a voice of one delight,

The winds, the birds, the ocean floods,
The city's voice itself is soft, like Solitude's.
I see the deep's untrampled floor

With green and purple sea-weeds strown;
I see the waves upon the shore,

Like light dissolved in star-showers thrown;
I sit upon the sands alone,

The lightning of the noontide ocean
Is flashing round me, and a tone

Arises from its measured motion;
How sweet, did any heart now share in my emotion !
Alas ! I have nor hope nor health,

Nor peace within, nor calm around,
Nor that content, surpassing wealth,

The sage in meditation found,
And walked with inward glory crowned ;

Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.
Others I see whom these surround-

Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.
Yet now despair itself is mild,

Even as the winds and waters are;
I could lie down like a tired child,

And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne, and yet must bear,

Till death like sleep might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air

My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.
Some might lament that I were cold,

As I, when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,

Insults with this untimely moan;
hey might lament-for I am one
Whom men love not; and yet regret,
Unlike this day, which, when the sun

Shall on its stainless glory set,
Wil linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet.

On a Faded Violet.

The colour from the flower is gone,
Which like thy sweet eyes smiled on

me:
The odour from the flower is flown,

Which breathed of thee, and only thee. A withered, lifeless, vacant form,

It lies on my abandoned breast,

And mocks the heart which yet is warm

With cold and silent rest.
I weep--my tears revive it not;

I sigh-it breathes no more on me;
Its mute and uncomplaining lot

Is such as mine should be.

Lines to an Indian Air. I arise from dreams of thee,

The nightingale's complaint, In the first sweet sleep of night,

It dies upon her heart,
When the winds are breathing low, As I must do on thine,
And the stars are shining bright;

O beloved as thou art!
I arise from dreams of thee,
And a spirit in my feet

O lift me from the grass !
Has led me who knows how ?

I die, I faint, I fail;
To thy chamber window, sweet. Let thy love in kisses rain

On my lips and eyelids pale.
The wandering airs they faint

My cheek is cold and white, alas! On the dark and silent stream,

My heart beats loud and fast; The Champak odours fail

Oh! press it close to thine again, Like sweet thoughts in a dream;

Where it will break at last.

То Music, when soft voices die,

Rose leaves, when the rose is dearl, Vibrates in the memory

Are heaped for the beloved's be 1; Odours, when sweet violets sicken, And so thy thoughts, when thou a t gone,

Live within the sense they quicken. Love itself shall slumber on.

JOHN KEATS.

le re

JOHN KEATS was born in London, October 29, 1795, in the house of his grandfather, who kept a livery-stable at Moorfields. ceived his education at Enfield, and in his fifteenth year was a sprenticed to a surgeon.

Most of his time, however, was devoted to the cultivation of bis literary talents, which were early conspi.uous. During his apprenticeship, he made and carefully wrote out a literal translation of Virgil's ' Æneid, but he does not appear to hav: been familiar with more difficult Latin poetry, nor to have even commenced learning the Greek language (Lord Houghton). One of his earliest friends and critics was Mr. Leigh Hunt, who, being shewn some of his poetical pieces, was struck, he says, with the exuberant specimens of genuine though young poetry that were laid before lim, and the promise of which was seconded by the fine fervid countenance of the writer. A volume of these juvenile poems was published in 1817. In 1818 Keats published his 'Endymion, a Poetic Romance,' defective in many parts, but evincing rich though undisciplined powers of imagination. The poem was criticised, in a strain of contemptuous severity, by Mr. John Wilson Croker in the ‘Quarterly Review; and such was the sensitiveness of the young poet panting for distinction, and flattered by a few private friends--that the critique imbittered his existence. "The first effects,' says She:ley, ‘are described to me to have resembled insanity, and it was by assiduous watching that he was restrained from effecting purposes or suicide. The agony of his sufferings at length produced the rupture of a blood-vessel in the lungs, and the usual process of consumptiou appears to have begun.' The process had begun, as was too soon apa parent; but the disease was a family one, and would probably have appeared had no hostile criticism existed. Lord Houghton, Keata's