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ODE TO SUICIDE.

BY THE REV. J. WHITEHOUSE.

DARK, sullen power!

Whom oft beside some ruined wall I've seen,

With stolen step, and clouded mien,

Gathering the night-shade's juices pale,

When shadows dimmed the moon, and midnight hour

Tolled from some steeple nigh!

And downy sleep

Refused to steep

In opiate dews thy ghastly-glaring eye!
While at thy elbow stood Despair,

Grim-visaged man! with bristled hair,

Shaking aloft his iron flail!

And in the blasted vale

The raven shrieked with funeral cry,

A choral dirge the Furies sung,

And while Fate's solemn knell was rung,

Thy voice of dreary dole still bade the wretched

die.

Hence away!-thou fiend forlorn!
Nor bid me climb yon summit steep,
That beetling o'er the fearful deep,

Hears the hoarse surge, and the wild tempest borne,
In ceaseless turmoil o'er the wintry main,

Rush by with hideous sweep!

Nor whisper in my startled ear

Thy murmured woes, whose accents drear
Freeze the warm blood; with dire controul
Strike Reason's mintage from the soul,

And all it's powers enchain,

Till from her anchor Hope reluctant driven, Foregoes her firm support, and quits her hold on heaven.

Nor yet, where thick-incumbent shadows scowl,
Meet me, beside the lonely wood,

When night comes lowering on, and the winds howl
Among the branches-rapt in pensive mood,
If there, indulging grief, I chance to stray,
While stern Adversity's dire ills infest,
Or untamed passion boil within my breast,
Ah, turn thy steps afar, nor cross my way!
Lest of light's cheering ray

Bereft, and wildered more, as thy dim form
Bids Fancy saddest hues of sorrow bring,

While Death, half-seen, amidst the twilight storm

Sails by on dusky wing;

Aghast, and vanquish'd by thy potent spells,

I drop into the gulph where Frenzy dwells!

THE DISCOVERY.

BY MISS PEARSON.

"Tis said the witching power of Love
Can give deformity a grace,
Shed lustre o'er the dullest face,
And hide the vixen in the Dove.

While o'er the soul the Tyrant sways,
The beauteous object we select
Has elegance and intellect,
And eyes that dart celestial rays

On the poor Lover's dazzled sight,

Altho' those eyes no language speak,
Nor rose, nor dimple bless the cheek,
Nor common sense one phrase indite.

But when the magic medium fades,
Thro' which the form so brightly shone,
And made each excellence its own,
O! what a change in Men and Maids!

This Edward to Maria prov'd

Full of the little God he sail'd, And many a foreign port he hail'd, Far from the angel girl he lov❜d.

At length he sought his native shore:

Six tedious years had seen him roam, The seventh brought the Wanderer home To fond, expecting Mary's door.

But Absence, love's inveterate foe,
Had wasted Edward's ardent flame
To almost nothing but a name,
Tam'd it to Friendship's sober glow.

The spell that bound him was no more!
He now with different optics saw,
And in her beauty found a flaw
He never had perceiv'd before.

How chang'd, he cry'd, in form and face!
"Ye Gods! is this Maria? Why
"Maria! you have lost an eye!
"When did this accident take place?".

The poor girl heaving piteous sighs,
Replied in accents of despair,
"Edward, I never had two eyes;
"But you, alas! have found a pair!"

EPIGRAM,

On a Lady of execrable Temper being burnt out by a late Fire.

THIS Dame, of a temper infernally hot,
Should not at her losses be vext;

A scorching perhaps in this world she has got,
A broiling to save in the next.

SCANDINAVIA, DEC. 3, 1804.

G. H. D.

LINES

Addressed to the Duchess of Bolton, as an Excuse for not undertaking the Part of Alicia, which the Authoress was solicited to act in the private Exhibition of the Play of Jane Shore, at Hackwood, in 1787.

BY MRS. LEFROY.

ALL to the part unus'd, my faltering tongue
Would mar the tuneful strains which Rowe has sung.
Can I, a wife, a mother, tread the stage,
Burn with false fires, and glow with inimic rage?
Quit of domestic scenes the calm retreat,

As mad Alicia teach my heart to beat?

And while my bosom bleeds for Shore's sad fate,
Spurn the dejected mourner from my gate?
Too well her woes by Caroline* exprest,
Compassion's sighs would rend my heaving breast:
No more the vengeful fair with shortening breath
Wildly exclaiming at her Hastings' death,
But sorrowing over Shore's unequall'd woe,
Accents of pity from my lips would flow!
Ah, spare me then, unable to withstand
When lovely Katherine † asks, and you command!

* Lady Caroline Barry.

+ Lady Katherine Powlett,

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