THE EXCHANGE.

WE pledged our hearts, my love and I,-
I in my arms the maiden clasping;
I could not tell the reason why,

But, oh! I trembled like an aspen.

Her father's love she bade me gain;
I went, and shook like any reed!
I strove to act the man-in vain!
We had exchanged our hearts indeed.

THE ALIENATED MISTRESS:

A MADRIGAL.

(FROM AN UNFINISHED MELODRAMA.)

Lady. If Love be dead, (and you aver it!) Tell me, Bard! where Love lies buried.

Poet. Love lies buried where 'twas born:
Ah, faithless Nymph! think it no scorn
If in my fancy I presume

To name thy bosom poor Love's Tomb.
And on that Tomb to read the line,—
"Here lies a Love that once was mine,
But took a chill, as I divine,

And died at length of a decline."

THE SUICIDE'S ARGUMENT.

ERE the birth of my life, if I wish'd it or no,
No question was ask'd me-it could not be so!
If the life was the question, a thing sent to try,
And to live on be Yes; what can No be? to die.

NATURE'S ANSWER.

Is't returned, as 'twas sent? Is't no worse for the wear?

Think first, what you are! Call to mind what you were!

I gave you innocence, I gave you hope,

Gave health, and genius, and an ample scope.
Return you me guilt, lethargy, despair?
Make out the invent'ry; inspect, compare!
Then die—if die you dare!

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.

SANCTI DOMINICI PALLIUM;

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN POET AND FRIEND,

FOUND WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAF AT THE BEGINNING OF BUTLER'S BOOK OF THE CHURCH.

POET.

I NOTE the moods and feelings men betray,
And heed them more than aught they do or say ;
The lingering ghosts of many a secret deed
Still-born or haply strangled in its birth;

These best reveal the smooth man's inward creed!
These mark the spot where lies the treasure
Worth!

made

up

of impudence and trick, With cloven tongue prepared to hiss and lick, Rome's brazen serpent-boldly dares discuss The roasting of thy heart, O brave John Huss! And with grim triumph and a truculent glee Absolves anew the Pope-wrought perfidy, That made an empire's plighted faith a lie, And fix'd a broad stare on the Devil's eye(Pleased with the guilt, yet envy-stung at heart To stand outmaster'd in his own black art!) Yet

FRIEND.

Enough of! we're agreed,

Who now defends would then have done the deed.
But who not feels persuasion's gentle sway,
Who but must meet the proffer'd hand half way
When courteous

POET. (aside)

(Rome's smooth go-between !)

FRIEND.

Laments the advice that sour'd a milky queen— (For "bloody" all enlighten'd men confess An antiquated error of the press :)

Who rapt by zeal beyond her sex's bounds,
With actual cautery staunch'd the Church's
wounds!

And tho' he deems, that with too broad a blur
We damn the French and Irish massacre,
Yet blames them both-and thinks the Pope
might err !

What think you now?

[shield

Boots it with
Boots it with spear and

Against such gentle foes to take the field

Whose beck'ning hands the mild Caduceus wield?

POET.

What think I now? Ev'n what I thought be

fore;

What

boasts tho'

may deplore,

SANCTI DOMINICI PALLIUM.

83

Still I repeat, words lead me not astray
When the shown feeling points a different way.
Smooth
can say grace at slander's feast,
And bless each haut-gout cook'd by monk or priest;
Leaves the full lie on 's gong to swell,
Content with half-truths that do just as well;
But duly decks his mitred comrade's flanks,
And with him shares the Irish nation's thanks!

So much for you, my Friend! who own a
Church,

And would not leave your mother in the lurch!
But when a Liberal asks me what I think-
Scared by the blood and soot of Cobbett's ink,
And Jeffrey's glairy phlegm and Connor's foam,
In search of some safe parable I roam—
An emblem sometimes may comprise a tome!

Disclaimant of his uncaught grandsire's mood, I see a tiger lapping kitten's food:

And who shall blame him that he purs applause, When brother Brindle pleads the good old cause ; And frisks his pretty tail, and half unsheathes his claws!

Yet not the less, for modern lights unapt,

I trust the bolts and cross-bars of the laws
More than the Protestant milk all newly lapt,
Impearling a tame wild-cat's whiskered jaws!