SONG.

Dost thou idly ask to hear
At what gentle seasons
Nymphs relent, when lovers near
Press the tenderest reasons?
Ah, they give their faith too oft
To the careless wooer ;
Maidens' hearts are always soft;
Would that men's were truer !

Woo the fair one, when around
Early birds are singing;

When, o'er all the fragrant ground,

Early herbs are springing:

When the brookside, bank, and grove,

All with blossoms laden,

Shine with beauty, breathe of love,—

Woo the timid maiden.

Woo her when, with rosy blush,

Summer eve is sinking;

When, on rills that softly gush,

Stars are softly winking;

When, through boughs that knit the bower,
Moonlight gleams are stealing;

Woo her, till the gentle hour
Wake a gentler feeling.

Woo her, when autumnal dies
Tinge the woody mountain;
When the dropping foliage lies,
In the weedy fountain;
Let the scene, that tells how fast

Youth is passing over,

Warn her, ere her bloom is past,

To secure her lover.

Woo her, when the northwinds call

At the lattice nightly;
When, within the cheerful hall,

Blaze the fagots brightly;
While the wintry tempest round

Sweeps the landscape hoary
Sweeter in her ear shall sound

Love's delightful story.

LOVE AND FOLLY.

(FROM LA FONTAINE.)

LOVE's worshippers alone can know
The thousand mysteries that are his;
His blazing torch, his twanging bow,
His blooming age are mysteries.
A charming science-but the day
Were all too short to con it o'er;
So take of me this little lay,

A sample of its boundless lore.

As once, beneath the fragrant shade

Of myrtles breathing heaven's own air, The children, Love and Folly, playedA quarrel rose betwixt the pair. Love said the gods should do him rightBut Folly vowed to do it then, And struck him, o'er the orbs of sight, So hard, he never saw again.

His lovely mother's grief was deep,

She called for vengeance on the deed;

A beauty does not vainly weep,

Nor coldly does a mother plead.

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LOVE AND FOLLY.

A shade came o'er the eternal bliss

That fills the dwellers of the skies
;

Even stony-hearted Nemesis,

And Rhadamanthus, wiped their eyes.

"Behold," she said, "this lovely boy,"

While streamed afresh her graceful tears, "Immortal, yet shut out from joy

And sunshine, all his future years.
The child can never take, you see,
A single step without a staff-
The harshest punishment would be
Too lenient for the crime by half."

All said that Love had suffered wrong,
And well that wrong should be repaid;
Then weighed the public interest long,
And long the party's interest weighed.
And thus decreed the court above-
"Since Love is blind from Folly's blow,
Let Folly be the guide of Love,

Where'er the boy may choose to go."

FATIMA AND RADUAN.

(FROM THE SPANISH.)

Diamante falso y fingido,
Engastado en pedernal, &c.

FALSE diamond set in flint! the caverns of the mine

Are warmer than the breast that holds that faithless heart of

thine;

Thou art fickle as the sea, thou art wandering as the wind, And the restless ever-mounting flame is not more hard to

bind.

If the tears I shed were tongues, yet all too few would be, To tell of all the treachery that thou hast shown to me. Oh! I could chide thee sharply-but every maiden knows That she who chides her lover, forgives him ere he goes.

Thou hast called me oft the flower of all Grenada's maids, Thou hast said that by the side of me the first and fairest fades ;

And they thought thy heart was mine, and it seemed to every

one

That what thou didst to win my love, from love of me was

done.