the blade of dark-brown Luno. The gleaming path of the steel winds through the gloomy ghost. The form fell shapeless into air, like a column of smoke, which the staff of the boy disturbs, as it rises from the half-extinguished furnace.

The spirit of Loda shrieked, as, rolled into himself, he rose on the wind. Inistore shook at the sound, the waves heard it on the deep. They stopped in their course with fear the friends of Fingal started at once, and took their heavy spears. They missed the king; they rose in rage; all their arms resound!

ADDRESS TO THE MOON.

Daughter of heaven, fair art thou! the silence of thy face is pleasant! Thou comest forth in loveliness. The stars attend thy blue course in the east. The clouds rejoice in thy presence, O moon! they brighten their dark-brown sides. Who is like thee in heaven, light of the silent night? The stars are ashamed in thy presence. They turn away their sparkling eyes. Whither dost thou retire from thy course, when the darkness of thy countenance grows? hast thou thy hall, like Ossian? dwellest thou in the shadow of grief? have thy sisters fallen from heaven? are they who rejoiced with thee at night no more? Yes, they have fallen, fair light! and thou dost often retire to mourn. But thou thyself shalt fail one night, and leave thy blue path in heaven. The stars will then lift their heads: they, who were ashamed in thy presence, will rejoice. Thou art now clothed with thy brightness. Look from thy gates in the sky. Burst the cloud, O wind! that the daughter of night may look forth! that the shaggy mountains may brighten, and the ocean roll its white waves in light.

FINGAL'S SPIRIT-HOME.

Malvina rises in
She beholds the

His friends sit around the king, on mist! They hear the songs of Ullin: he strikes the half-viewless harp. He raises the feeble voice. The lesser heroes, with a thousand meteors, light the airy hall. the midst; a blush is on her cheek. unknown faces of her fathers. She turns aside her humid eyes. 'Art thou come so soon?' said Fingal, 'daughter of generous Toscar. Sadness dwells in the halls of Lutha. My aged son is sad! I hear the breeze of Cona, that was wont to lift thy heavy locks. It comes to the hall, but thou art not there. Its voice is mournful among the arms of thy fathers! Go, with thy rustling wing, O breeze! sigh on Malvina's tomb. It rises yonder beneath the rock, at the blue stream of Lutha. The maids are departed to their place. Thou alone, O breeze, mournest there!'

THE CAVE.

1 The wind is up, the field is bare,
Some hermit lead me to his cell,

Where Contemplation, lonely fair,

With blessed content has chose to dwell.

2 Behold! it opens to my sight,

Dark in the rock, beside the flood;
Dry fern around obstructs the light;
The winds above it move the wood.

3 Reflected in the lake, I see

The downward mountains and the skies,
The flying bird, the waving tree,
The goats that on the hill arise.

4 The gray-cloaked herd' drives on the cow;
The slow-paced fowler walks the heath;
A freckled pointer scours the brow;
A musing shepherd stands beneath.

5 Curved o'er the ruin of an oak,

The woodman lifts his axe on high;
The hills re-echo to the stroke;
I see I see the shivers fly!

6 Some rural maid, with apron full,
Brings fuel to the homely flame;
I see the smoky columns roll,

And, through the chinky hut, the beam.

7 Beside a stone o'ergrown with moss,
Two well-met hunters talk at ease;
Three panting dogs beside repose;
One bleeding deer is stretched on grass.

8 A lake at distance spreads to sight,
Skirted with shady forests round;
In midst, an island's rocky height
Sustains a ruin, once renowned.

9 One tree bends o'er the naked walls; Two broad-winged eagles hover nigh; By intervals a fragment falls,

As blows the blast along the sky.

10 The rough-spun hinds the pinnace guide With labouring oars along the flood;

An angler, bending o'er the tide,

Hangs from the boat the insidious wood.

1'Herd': neat-herd.

11 Beside the flood, beneath the rocks,

On grassy bank, two lovers lean;
Bend on each other amorous looks,
And seem to laugh and kiss between.

12 The wind is rustling in the oak;

They seem to hear the tread of feet;
They start, they rise, look round the rock;
Again they smile, again they meet.

13 But see! the gray mist from the lake
Ascends upon the shady hills;

Dark storms the murmuring forests shake,
Rain beats around a hundred rills.

14 To Damon's homely hut I fly;
I see it smoking on the plain;
When storms are past and fair the sky,
I'll often seek my cave again.

WILLIAM MASON.

THIS gentleman is now nearly forgotten, except as the friend, biographer, and literary executor of Gray. He was born in 1725, and died in 1797. His tragedies, 'Elfrida' and 'Caractacus,' are spirited declamations in dramatic form, not dramas. His odes have the turgidity without the grandeur of Gray's. His 'English Garden' is too long and too formal. His Life of Gray was an admirable innovation on the form of biography then prevalent, interspersing, as it does, journals and letters with mere narrative. Mason was a royal chaplain, held the living of Ashton, and was precentor of York Cathedral. We quote the best of his minor poems.

EPITAPH ON MRS MASON,

IN THE CATHEDRAL OF BRISTOL.

1 Take, holy earth! all that my soul holds dear:
Take that best gift which Heaven so lately gave:
To Bristol's fount I bore with trembling care
Her faded form; she bowed to taste the wave,
And died. Does youth, does beauty, read the line?
Does sympathetic fear their breasts alarm?
Speak, dead Maria! breathe a strain divine:

Even from the grave thou shalt have power to charm.

2 Bid them be chaste, be innocent, like thee;
Bid them in duty's sphere as meekly move;

And if so fair, from vanity as free;

As firm in friendship, and as fond in love; Tell them, though 'tis an awful thing to die,

('Twas even to thee,) yet the dread path once trod, Heaven lifts its everlasting portals high,

And bids the pure in heart behold their God.'

AN HEROIC EPISTLE TO SIR WILLIAM CHAMBERS, KNIGHT, COMP-
TROLLER-GENERAL OF HIS MAJESTY'S WORKS, ETC.

Knight of the Polar Star! by fortune placed
To shine the Cynosure of British taste;
Whose orb collects in one refulgent view
The scattered glories of Chinese virtù;
And spreads their lustre in so broad a blaze,
That kings themselves are dazzled while they gaze:
Oh, let the Muse attend thy march sublime,
And, with thy prose, caparison her rhyme;
Teach her, like thee, to gild her splendid song,
With scenes of Yven-Ming, and sayings of Li-Tsong;

VOL. III.

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