His right to kill, conditioning thy life
Should thenceforth be his property :-besides,
"Tis wholesome for thy morals to be brought
From savage climes into a civilized state,
Into the decencies of Christendom.—
Bear! Bear! it passes in the Parliament
For excellent logic this! what if we say
How barbarously man abuses power,
Talk of thy baiting, it will be replied,
Thy welfare is thy owner's interest,
But wert thou baited it would injure thee,
Therefore thou art not baited. For seven years
Hear it o Heaven, and give ear o Earth!
For seven long years this precious syllogisma
Has baffled justice and humanity!

THEODERIT.

THE IVY.

I stood beneath the castle wall
And mark'd the ivy bower,
That fragrant in its autumn bloom
Wreathed round the mouldering tower.

The plant insinuates its roots

To rend the ruined wall,

And yet with close and treacherous arms
Suspends awhile its fall.

I mus'd upon its antient strength
Its hastening dissolution,

And thought upon the Ivy friends
Who prop our Constitution.

R.

MONODRAMA.

The WIFE of FERGUS.

Fergusius 3. perüt veneno ab uxore dato. Alii scribunt cum uxor sæpe exprobrasset ei matrimonii contemptum et pellicum greges, neque quicquam profecisset, tandem noctu dormientem ab eâ strangulatum. Quæstione de morte ejus habitâ, cum amicorum plurimi insimularentur, nec quisquam ne in gravissimis quidem tormentis quicquam fateretur, mulier, alioqui ferox, tot innoxiorum capitum miserta, in medium processit, ac e superiore loco cædem a se factam confessa, ne ad ludibrium superesset, pectus cultro transfodit: quod ejus factum varie pro cujusque ingenio est acceptum, ac perinde sermonibus celebratum.

Buchanan.

SCINE the Palace Court. The Queen speaking from the Battlements.

Cease cease your torments! spare the sufferers! Scotchmen, not theirs the deed;-the crime was mine, Mine is the glory.

Idle threats! I stand

Secure. All access to these battlements

Is barr'd beyond your sudden strength to force,
And lo! the dagger by which Fergus died!

Shame on you Scotchmen, that a woman's hand
Was left to do this deed! Shame on you Thanes,
Who with slave-patience have so long endured
The wrongs, the insolence of tyranny!

Ye coward race that not a husband's sword
Smote that adulterous King! that not a wife
Revenged her own pollution, in his blood
Wash'd her soul pure, and for the sin compell'd
Atoned by virtuous murder! oh my God!
Of what beast-matter hast thou moulded them
To bear with wrongs like these? there was a time
When if the Bard had feign'd you such a tale
Your eyes had throbb'd with anger, and your hands
In honest instinct would have graspt the sword.
O miserable men who have disgraced

Your fathers, whom your sons must blush to name !

Aye-ye can threaten me! ye can be brave

In anger to a woman! one whose virtue

Upbraids your coward vice; whose name will live

Honoured and prais'd in song, when not a hand
Shall root from your forgotten monuments

The cankering moss.

Fools! fools! to think that death

Is not a thing familiar to my mind !
As if I knew not what must consummate
My glory! as if ought that earth can give
Could tempt me to endure the load of life!
Scotchmen! ye saw when Fergus to the altar
Led me, his maiden Queen. Ye blest me then,
I heard you bless me, and I thought that Heaven
Had heard you also and that I was blest,
For I loved Fergus. Bear me witness, God!'
With what a sacred heart-sincerity

My lips pronounced the unrecallable vow

That made me his, him mine; bear witness Thou!
Before whose throne I this day must appear
Stain'd with his blood and mine! my heart was his-
His in the strength of all its first affections.

In all obedience, in all love, I kept

Holy my marriage vow. Behold me Thanes !
Time hath not changed the face on which his eye
So often dwelt, when with assiduous care

He sought my love, with seeming truth, for one,
Sincere herself, impossible to doubt.

Time hath not changed that face ;-I speak not now