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She glances on, in her glory proud;
A few bright suns, and at rest she lies,
Glittering to transatlantic skies!

Simpleton man! why, who would have thought
To this, the song of a tea-kettle brought!

JOANNA BAILLIE.

MISS BAILLIE (1762-1851) was the daughter of a Scottish minister, and was born in the manse or parsonage of Bothwell, county of Lanark. In this manse, 'repression of all emotions, even the gentlest, and those most honourable to human nature, seems to have been the constant lesson.' Joanna's sister, Agnes, told Lucy Aiken that their father was an excellent parent: when she had once been bitten by a dog thought to be mad, he had sucked the wound, at the hazard, as was supposed, of his own life, but that he had never given her a kiss. Joanna spoke of her yearning to be caressed when a child. She would sometimes venture to clasp her little arms about her mother's knees, who would seem to chide her, but the child knew she liked it.' Her latter years were spent in comparative retirement at Hempstead, where she died February 23, 1851. Besides her dramas (afterwards noticed), Miss Baillie wrote some admirable Scottish songs and other poetical pieces, which were collected and published under the title of Fugitive Verses.' In society, as in literature, this lady was regarded with affectionate respect and veneration, enjoying the friendship of most of her distinguished contemporaries. Lockhart, in his 'Life of Scott,' states that Miss Baillie and her brother, Dr. Matthew Baillie, were among the friends to whose intercourse Sir Walter looked forward with the greatest pleasure, when about to visit the metropolis.

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Wanton droll, whose harmless play
Beguiles the rustic's closing day,
When drawn the evening fire about,
Sit aged Crone and thoughtless Lout,
And child upon his three-foot stool,
Waiting till his supper cool;
And maid, whose cheek outblooms the
rose,

As bright the blazing fagot glows,
Who, bending to the friendly light,
Plies her task with busy sleight;
Come,shew thy tricks and sportive graces,
Thus circled round with merry faces.

As oft beyond thy curving side
Its jetty tip is seen to glide;
Till, from thy centre starting fair,
Thou sidelong rear'st, with rump in air,
Erected stiff, and gait awry,
Like madam in her tantrums high:
Though ne'er a madam of them all,
Whose silken kirtle sweeps the hall,
More varied trick and whim displays,
To catch the admiring stranger's gaze.
The featest tumbler, stage-bedight,
To thee is but a clumsy wight,
Who every limb and sinew strains
To do what cost thee little pains;
For which, I trow, the gaping crowd
Requites him oft with plaudits lond.
But, stopped the while thy wanton play,
Applauses, too, thy feats repay:
For then beneath some urchin's hand,
With modest pride thou tak'st thy stand,
While many a stroke of fondness glides
Along thy back and tabby sides.
Dilated swells thy glossy fur,
Memoirs of Lucy Aikin. London, 1864.

Backward coiled, and crouching low,
With glaring eyeballs watch thy foe,
The housewife's spindle whirling round,
Or thread, or straw, that on the ground
Its shadow throws, by urchin sly
Held out to lure thy roving eye;
Then, onward stealing, fiercely spring
Upon the futile, faithless thing.
Now, wheeling round, with bootless skill,
Thy bo-peep tail provokes thee still,

And loudly sings thy busy pur,
As, timing well the equal sound,
Thy clutching feet bepat the ground,
And all their harmless claws disclose,
Like prickles of an early rose;
While softly from thy whiskered cheek
Thy half-closed eyes peer mild and meek.
But not alone by cottage fire
Do rustics rude thy feats admire;

Who in the still, but cheerless shade
Of home unsocial, spends her age,
And rarely turns a lettered page;
Upon her hearth for thee lets fall
The rounded cork, or paper-ball,
Nor chides thee on thy wicked watch
The ends of ravelled skein to catch,
But lets thee have thy wayward will,
Perplexing oft her sober skill.

The learned sage, whose thoughts ex- Even he, whose mind of gloomy bent,

plore

The widest range of human lore,
Or, with unfettered fancy, fly
Through airy heights of poesy,
Pausing, smiles with altered air
To see thee climb his elbow chair,
Or, struggling on the mat below,
Hold warfare with his slippered toe.
The widowed dame, or lonely maid,

In lonely tower or prison pent,
Reviews the coil of former days,
And loathes the world and all its ways;
What time the lamp's unsteady gleam
Doth rouse him from his moody dream,
Feels, as thou gambol'st round his seat,
His heart with pride less fiercely beat,
And smiles, a link in thee to find
That joins him still to living kind

From Address to Miss Agnes Baillie on her Birthday.'*

Dear Agnes, gleamed with joy and dashed with tears
O'er us have glided almost sixty years,

Since we on Bothwell's bonny braes were seen

By those whose eyes long closed in death have been-
Two tiny imps, who scarcely stooped to gather
The slender harebell on the purple heather;
No taller than the foxglove's spiky stem,
That dew of morning studs with silvery gem.
Then every butterfly that crossed our view
With joyful shout was greeted as it flew ;
And moth, and lady-bird, and beetle bright,
In sheeny gold, were each a wondrous sight.
Then as we paddled barefoot, side by side,
Among the sunny shallows of the Clyde,
Minnows or spotted parr with twinkling fin,
Swimming in mazy rings the pool within.
A thrill of gladness through our bosoms sent,
Seen in the power of early wonderment.

A long perspective to my mind appears,
Looking behind me to that line of years;
And yet through every stage I still can trace
Thy visioned form, from childhood's morning grace
To woman's early bloom-changing, how soon!
To the expressive glow of woman's noon;
And now to what thou art, in comely age,
Active and ardent. Let what will engage
Thy present moment-whether hopeful seeds
In garden-plat thou sow, or noxious weeds
From the fair flower remove, or ancient lore
In chronicle or legend rare explore,

Or on the parlour hearth with kitten play,

* The author and her sister lived to an advanced age, constantly in each other's society. Miss Agnes Baillie died April 27, 1861, aged 100.

The manse of Bothwell was at some considerable distance from the Clyde, but the two little girls were sometimes sent there in summer to bathe and wade about. said she 'rambled over the heaths and plashed in the brook most of the day.' she said to Lucy Aikin. I could not read well till nine years old.' O Joanna,' cried her sister, not till eleven.'-Memoirs of Lucy Aikin.

Joanna

One day

Stroking its tabby sides, or take thy way
To gain with hasty steps some cottage door,
On helpful errand to the neighboring poor-
Active and ardent, to my fancy's eye

Thou still art young, in spite of time gone by.
Though oft of patience brief, and temper keen,
Well may it please me, in life's latter scene,

To think what now thou art and long to me hast been. "Twas thou who woo'dst me first to look

Upon the page of printed book,

That thing by me abhorred, and with address
Didst win me from my thoughtless idleness,
When all too old become with bootless haste
In fitful sports the precious time to waste.
Thy love of tale and story was the stroke
At which my dormant fancy first awoke,
And ghosts and witches in my busy brain
Arose in sombre show a motley train.
This new-found path attempting, proud was I
Lurking approval on thy face to spy,
Or hear thee say, as grew thy roused attention,
'What! is this story all thine own invention ?'
Then, as advancing through this mortal span,
Our intercourse with the mixed world began;
Thy fairer face and sprightlier courtesy-
A truth that from my youthful vanity
Lay not concealed-did for the sisters twain,
Where'er we went, the greater favour gain;
While, but for thee, vexed with its tossing tide,
I from the busy world had shrunk aside.
And now, in later years, with better grace,
Thou help'st me still to hold a welcome place

With those whom nearer neighbourhood have made
The friendly cheerers of our evening shade.
The change of good and evil to abide,

As partners linked, long have we, side by side,
Our earthly journey held; and who can say
How near the end of our united way?

By nature's course not distant; sad and 'reft
Will she remain-the lonely pilgrim left.

If thou art taken first, who can to me

Like sister, friend, and home-companion be?

Or who, of wonted daily kindness shorn,

Shall feel such loss, or mourn as I shall mourn?

And if I should be fated first to leave

This earthly house, though gentle friends may grieve, And he above them all, so truly proved

A friend and brother, long and justly loved,

There is no living wight, of woman born,

Who then shall mourn for me as thou wilt mourn.

Thou ardent, liberal spirit! quickly feeling

The touch of sympathy, and kindly dealing

With sorrow or distress, for ever sharing

The unhoarded mite, nor for to-morrow caring-
Accept, dear Agnes, on thy natal day,

An unadorned, but not a careless lay.
Nor think this tribute to thy virtues paid

From tardy love proceeds, though long delayed
Words of affection, howsoe'er expressed,
The latest spoken still are deemed the best:
Few are the measured rhymes I now may write;
These are, perhaps, the last I shall indite.

The

The gowan glitters on the sward,
The lav'rock's in the sky,
And Collie on my plaid keeps ward,
And time is passing by.

Oh, no! sad an' slow!
I hear nae welcome sound;
The shadow of our trystin' bush,
It wears sae slowly round!

My sheep-bell tinkles frae the west,
My lambs are bleating near,
But still the sound that I lo'e best,
Alack! I canna hear.

Oh, no! sad an' slow!
The shadow lingers still;
And like a lanely ghaist I stand,
And croon upon the hill.

I hear below the water roar,
The mill wi' clackin' din;
And Lucky scoldin' frae her door,
To bring the bairnies in.

Oh, no! sad an' slow!
These are nae sound for me;
The shadow of our trystin' bush,
It creeps sae drearily.

Shepherd's Song.

I coft yestreen frae chapman Tam,
A snood of bonnie blue,

And promised when our trystin' cam',
To tie it round her brow.

Oh, no! sad an' slow!
The time it winna pass;
The shadow of that weary thorn
Is tethered on the grass.

Oh now I see her on the way,

She's past the witches' knowe;
She's climbin' up the brownie's brae-
My heart is in a lowe.

Oh, no! 'tis na so!
'Tis glaumrie I hae seen:

The shadow of that hawthorn bush
Will move nae mair till e'en.

My book of grace I'll try to read,
Though conned wi' little skill;
When Collie barks I'll raise my head.
And find her on the hill.

Oh, no! sad an' slow!
The time will ne'er be gane;
The shadow of the trystin' bush
Is fixed like ony stane.

WILLIAM KNOX-THOMAS PRINGLE.

WILLIAM KNOx, a young poet of considerable talent, who died in Edinburgh in 1821, aged thirty-six, was author of 'The Lonely Hearth,' 'Songs of Israel,' 'The Harp of Zion,' &c. Sir Walter Scott thus mentions Knox in his diary: His father was a respectable yeoman, and he himself succeeding to good farms under the Duke of Buccleuch, became too soon his own master, and plunged into dissipation and ruin.' His talent then shewed itself in a fine strain of pensive poetry. Knox thus concludes his 'Songs of Israel:'

My song hath closed, the holy dream

That raised my thoughts o'er all below, Hath faded like the lunar beam,

And left me 'mid a night of woeTo look and long, and sigh in vain For friends I ne'er shall meet again.

And yet the earth is green and gay,

And yet the skies are pure and bright; But, 'mid each gleam of pleasure gay, Some cloud of sorrow dims my sight: For weak is now the tenderest tongue That might my simple songs have sung.

And like to Gilead's drops of balm,

They for a moment soothed my breast;
But earth hath not a power to calm
My spirit in forgetful rest,
Until I lay me side by side

With those that loved me, and have died.

They died-and this a world of woe,

Of anxious doubt and chilling fear;
I wander onward to the tomb,

With scarce a hope to linger here:
But with a prospect to rejoin

The friends beloved, that once were mine.

THOMAS PRINGLE was born in Roxburghshire in 1788. He was concerned in the establishment of 'Blackwood's Magazine,' and was author of 'Scenes of Teviotdale,' Ephemerides,' and other poems, all of which display fine feeling and a cultivated taste. Although, from lameness, ill fitted for a life of roughness or hardships, Mr. Pringle,

with his father and several brothers, emigrated to the Cape of Good Hope in the year 1820, and there established a little township or settlement named Glen Lynden. The poet afterwards removed to Cape Town, the capital; but wearied with his Kaffirland exile, and disagreeing with the governor, he returned to England, and subsisted by his pen. He was sometime editor of the literary annual entitled Friendship's Offering.' His services were also engaged by the African Society, as secretary to that body, a situation which he con tinued to hold until within a few months of his death. In the dis charge of its duties he evinced a spirit of active humanity, and an ardent love of the cause to which he was devoted. His last work was a series of African Sketches,' containing an interesting personal narrative, interspersed with verses. Mr. Pringle died on the 5th of December, 1834, The following piece was much admired by Coleridge:

Afar in the Desert.

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,

With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side;
When the sorrows of life the soul o'ercast,
And, sick of the present, I turn to the past;
And the eye is suffused with regretful tears,
From the fond recollections of former years;

And the shadows of things that have long since fled,
Flit over the brain like the ghosts of the dead-
Bright visions of glory that vanished too soon-
Day-dreams that departed ere manhood's noon-
Attachments by fate or by falsehood reft-
Companions of early days lost or left-
And my Native Land! whose magical name
Thrills to my heart like electric flame;

The home of my childhood-the haunts of my prime;
All the passions and scenes of that rapturous time,
When the feelings were young and the world was new,
Like the fresh bowers of Paradise opening to view!
All-all now forsaken, forgotten, or gone;

And I, a lone exile, remembered of none,

My high aims abandoned, and good acts undone

Aweary of all that is under the sun;

With that sadness of heart which no stranger may scan,
I fly to the Desert afar from man.

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,

With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side;

When the wild turmoil of this wearisome life,

With its scenes of oppression, corruption, and strife;
The proud man's frown, and the base man's fear;
And the scorner's laugh, and the sufferer's tear;
And malice and meanness, and falsehood and folly,
Dispose me to musing and dark melancholy;
When my bosom is full, and my thoughts are high,
And my soul is sick with the bondman's sigh-
Oh then, there is freedom, and joy, and pride,

Afar in the Desert alone to ride!

There is rapture to vault on the champion steed,
And to bound away with the eagle's speed,,
With the death-fraught firelock in my hand-
The only law of the Desert land—

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