To wish thee fairer is no need,
More prudent or more sprightly,
Or more ingenious, or more freed
From temper-flaws unsightly.

What favour then not yet possess'd,
Can I for thee require,

In wedded love already bless'd

To thy whole heart's desire?

None here is happy but in part:
Full bliss is bliss divine;

There dwells some wish in every heart.
And doubtless one in thine.

That wish, on some fair future day,
Which Fate shall brightly gild,
('Tis blameless, be it what it may)
I wish it all fulfill'd.

CCC.

William Cowper.

TO A LADY.

'Tis not the lily brow I prize,
Nor roseate cheeks nor sunny eyes,-
Enough of lilies and of roses!

A thousand fold more dear to me

The look that gentle love discloses,— That look which Love alone can see.

CCCI.

Samuel T. Coleridge.

TO HESTER SAVORY.

WHEN maidens such as Hester die,
Their place we may not well supply,
Though we among a thousand try
With vain endeavour.

A month or more hath she been dead,
Yet cannot I by force be led

To think upon the wormy
And her together.

bed

A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step, did indicate
Of pride and joy no common rate
That flush'd her spirit:

I know not by what name beside
I shall it call; if 'twas not pride,
It was a joy to that allied
She did inherit.

Her parents held the Quaker rule
Which doth the human feeling cool;
But she was train'd in Nature's school
Nature had blest her.

A waking eye, a prying mind,

A heart that stirs, is hard to bind ;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind,
Ye could not Hester.

My sprightly neighbour! gone before
To that unknown and silent shore,
Shall we not meet, as heretofore
Some summer morning-
When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day,
A bliss that would not go away,
A sweet fore-warning?

Charles Lamb.

CCCII.

My Lilla gave me yestermorn
A rose, methinks in Eden born,
And as she gave it, little elf!
She blush'd like any rose herself.
Then said I, full of tenderness,

"Since this sweet rose I owe to you,

Dear girl, why may I not possess
The lovelier Rose that gave it too?"

Unknown.

CCCIII.

MARGARET AND DORA.

MARGARET's beauteous-Grecian arts
Ne'er drew form completer,
Yet why, in my heart of hearts,
Hold I Dora's sweeter?

Dora's eyes of heavenly blue
Pass all paintings' reach,
Ringdove's notes are discord to
The music of her speech.

Artists! Margaret's smile receive,
And on canvas show it;

But for perfect worship leave
Dora to her poet.

CCCIV.

Thomas Campbell.

CLEMENTINA AND LUCILLA.

IN Clementina's artless mien,
Lucilla asks me what I see,
And are the roses of sixteen

Enough for me?

Lucilla asks, if that be all,

Have I not cull'd as sweet before

Ah, yes, Lucilla! and their fall

I still deplore.

I now behold another scene,

Where Pleasure beams with heaven's own light,

More pure, more constant, more serene,

And not less bright.

Faith on whose breast the Loves repose,
Whose chain of flowers no force can sever,

And Modesty, who when she goes,

Is gone for ever.

Walter Savage Landor.

CCCV.

DEAR FANNY.

"SHE has beauty, but still you must keep your heart cool; She has wit, but you mustn't be caught so:

Thus Reason advises, but Reason's a fool,

And 'tis not the first time I have thought so,
Dear Fanny,

'Tis not the first time I have thought so.

"She is lovely; then love her, nor let the bliss fly; 'Tis the charm of youth's vanishing season; Thus Love has advised me, and who will deny That Love reasons much better than Reason,

Dear Fanny?

Love reasons much better than Reason.

Thomas Moore.

CCCVI.

TO LADY ANNE HAMILTON.

Too late I stay'd! forgive the crime,
Unheeded flew the hours;

How noiseless falls the foot of Time,
That only treads on flowers!

What eye with clear account remarks
The ebbing of his glass,

When all its sands are diamond sparks,
That dazzle as they pass?

Ah! who to sober measurement
Time's happy swiftness brings,
When birds of Paradise have lent
Their plumage for his wings?

Honble. William R. Spencer.

CCCVII.

THE JUDGMENT OF THE POETS.

Two nymphs, both nearly of an age,
Of numerous charms possess'd,
A warm dispute once chanced to wage,
Whose temper was the best.

The worth of each had been complete
Had both alike been mild:

But one, altho' her smile was sweet,
Frown'd oftener than she smiled.

And in her humour, when she frown'd,
Would raise her voice, and roar,
And shake with fury to the ground
The garland that she wore.

The other was of gentler cast,
From all such frenzy clear,

Her frowns were seldom known to last,
And never proved severe.

To poets of renown in song

The nymphs referr'd the cause,

And, strange to tell, all judged it wrong,
And gave misplaced applause.

They gentle call'd, and kind and soft,
The flippant and the scold,

And tho' she changed her mood so oft
That failing left untold.

No judges, sure, were e'er so mad,
Or so resolved to err-

In short, the charms her sister had
They lavish'd all on her.

Then thus the god, whom fondly they
Their great inspirer call,

Was heard, one genial summer's day,
To reprimand them all.