Ah! to return, to meet again! Dear blissful thought! with love and thee! No more I murmur and complain, For thou, my Love, wilt think on me. O TUNEFUL Voice! I still deplore In Echo's cave I long to dwell, And still would hear the sad Farewell!' When we were doom'd to part. Bright Eyes! ô that the task were mine To watch them with a Vestal's care, THE season comes when first we met, Why cannot I the days forget, Which time can ne'er restore? O! days too sweet, too bright to last, The fleeting shadows of delight, In fancy stop their rapid flight, But, ah! I wake to endless woes, WHEN hollow burst the rushing winds, For ah, my love! it little knows A wayward Fate hath twin'd the thread And darkling in the chequer'd shade, But whatsoe'er may be thy doom, The lot is cast for me; Or in the world, or in the tomb, WILLIAM PRESTON. 1781. William Preston, Esq. is the descendant of a family of great respectability in Ireland, where he mostly resides. He is a gentleman highly esteemed for the integrity of his principles, his social and general worth, the candour of his disposition, and the qualifications and attainments of his mind. His name has long been familiar to the admirers of genuine poetry. Some bold and interesting Strictures on the German Drama, which merit a more extensive circulation, were handed about, a few months since, as the production of Mr. Preston. SONNET. PALE virgin moon, and ever-burning choir, Ye lamps, that clip the throne of night around! Oft, on my cheek, the sorrows have ye found, That burst, in torrents, from the fierce Desire, And flow, but vainly flow, to quench its fire: Oft, have ye heard my bitter sighs around, Oft, seen despair my bleeding heart-strings wound, And double strength from every wound acquire. Oh! speak, for ye have seen what inmates dwell In the soft mansion of my CLARA's breast; Does calm untroubled peace inhabit there? Or, does her pity share the pangs I bear, And sympathetic sighs her bosom swell? I wish-I fear-my sorrows break her rest! SONNET. SINCE, CLARA, thou by Death's untimely hand Wert snatch'd from Earth, neglected have I rov'd; Nor peace, nor hope, nor joy, nor comfort prov'd. A single stranger here below I stand, Idle spectator of the busy band, By follies acted or by passions mov'd; THOMAS RUSSELL. 1782. The Rev. Thomas Russell, born at Bridport in Dorsetshire, about the year 1762, was the son of an eminent attorney of that place. Having imbibed the rudiments of education at a Grammar-school in his native county, he was removed to Winchester, under the mastership of the late Doctor Warton, to whom his poems were afterwards inscribed. In 1780, he was elected Fellow of New College, Oxford. While rising rapidly into distinction, for the extent and solidity of his literary acquisitions, he found himself at once interrupted by an illness, that terminated in a consumption of the lungs. He died at Bristol, whither he had resorted for the renovation of his health, July 31, 1788, in his twenty-sixth year. That he had often feelingly anticipated his melancholy fate, is evinced in the following Sonnet Once more return'd to curl the dimpling lake, And love, rekindling, glows in every breast: And woods renew their verdant robes in vain; His resignation of DELIA excites the strongest emotions of sympathy, when the circumstances of the lover are considered. A young and amiable man, fondly devoted to her charms, yet secretly impressed with the painful con. |