As lone he watched the taper's sickly gleam,
And at his casement heard, with wild affright,
The owl's dull wing and melancholy scream,
On this he thought, this, this, his sole desire,
Thus once again to hear the warbling woodland choir.
Henry Kirke White.

Troston.

TROSTON HALL.

MAR from the busy hum of men away,

FAR

Secluded here, naught of the world I see; And almost doubt if such a place there be As London's trading town, or Paris gay, Surcharged with crowds the livelong night and day. That war is going on by land and sea, That slaughter, tumult, horror, and dismay Pervade the world, now seemeth strange to me. And, as I pass the sweetly lonely hours, Estrangéd here from bustle, strife, and care, Surrounded but by woods and fields and flowers, While Nature's music floats along the air, And Autumn all her various bounties pours,

I wish an erring world these scenes with me to share.

Capel Loft.

SHE

Tunbridge.

PHOEBE, THE NYMPH OF THE WELL.

smiled as she gave him a draught from the springlet,

Tunbridge, thy waters are bitter, alas!

But love finds an ambush in dimple and ringlet; "Thy health, pretty maiden!"- He emptied the glass.

He saw, and he loved her, nor cared he to quit her;
The oftener he came, why the longer he stayed;
Indeed, though the spring was exceedingly bitter,
We found him eternally pledging the maid.

A preux chevalier, and but lately a cripple,
He met with his hurt where a regiment fell,
But worse was he wounded when staying to tipple
A bumper to "Phoebe, the Nymph of the Well."

Some swore he was old, that his laurels were faded,
All vowed she was vastly too nice for a nurse;
But Love never looks on the matter as they did,
She took the brave soldier for better or worse.

And here is the home of her fondest election,

The walls may be worn, but the ivy is green; And here she has tenderly twined her affection Around a true soldier who bled for the Queen.

See, yonder he sits, where the church-bells invite us; What child is that spelling the epitaphs there?

"T is the joy of his age, and may fate so requite us When time shall have broken, or sickness, or care.

Erelong, ay, too soon, a sad concourse will darken

The doors of that church and that peaceful abode; His place then no longer will know him, — but hearken, The widow and orphan appeal to their God.

Much peace will be hers.

"If our lot must be lowly, Resemble the father who's with us no more"; And only on days that are high or are holy,

She'll show him the cross that her warrior wore.

So taught, he will rather take after his father,
And wear a long sword to our enemies' loss;
And some day or other he'll bring to his mother
Victoria's gift,

the Victoria Cross!

And still she 'll be charming, though ringlet and dimple
Perhaps may have lost their peculiar spell;
And often she'll quote, with complacency simple,
The compliments paid to the Nymph of the Well.

And then will her darling, like all good and true ones,
Console and sustain her, the weak and the strong;
And some day or other two black eyes or blue ones
Will smile on his path as he journeys along.

Wherever they win him, whoever his Phoebe,

Of course of all beauty she must be the belle, — If at Tunbridge he chance to fall in with a Hebe, He will not fall out with a draught from the well.

Frederick Locker.

Twickenham.

THE CAVE OF POPE.

HEN dark Oblivion in her sable cloak

WHEN

Shall wrap the names of heroes and of kings; And their high deeds, submitting to the stroke Of time, shall fall amongst forgotten things:

Then (for the Muse that distant day can see)

On Thames's bank the stranger shall arrive,
With curious wish thy sacred grott to see,
Thy sacred grott shall with thy name survive.

Grateful posterity, from age to age,

With pious hand the ruin shall repair: Some good old man, to each inquiring sage Pointing the place, shall cry,

The bard lived there

"Whose song was music to the listening ear,

Yet taught audacious vice and folly shame: Easy his manners, but his life severe;

r

His word alone gave infamy or fame.

Sequestered from the fool and coxcomb-wit,

Beneath this silent roof the Muse he found;

Twas here he slept inspired, or sat and writ;

Here with his friends the social glass went round."

With awful veneration shall they trace

The steps which thou so long before hast trod;

With reverent wonder view the solemn place
From whence thy genius soared to nature's God.

Then, some small gem, or moss, or shining ore,

Departing, each shall pilfer, in fond hope
To please their friends on every distant shore,
Boasting a relic from the cave of Pope.

Anonymous.

Tyne and Wainsbeck.

TYNE AND WAINSBECK.

WOUL

I again were with you,

O ye

dales

Of Tyne, and ye most ancient woodlands! where,

Oft as the giant flood obliquely strides,

And his banks open, and his lawns extend,
Stops short the pleaséd traveller to view,
Presiding o'er the scene, some rustic tower
Founded by Norman or by Saxon hands;
O ye Northumbrian shades! which overlook
The rocky pavement and the mossy falls
Of solitary Wensbeck's limpid stream,
How gladly I recall your well-known seats
Beloved of old; and that delightful time
When, all alone, for many a summer's day
I wandered through your calm recesses, fed
In silence by some powerful hand unseen.

Mark Akenside.