A Pilgrim in this world of woe,
Condemn'd, alas! awhile to stray,

Where bristly thorns, where briars grow,
He bade, to cheer the gloomy way,
Its heav'nly music flow.

And oft he bade, by fame inspir'd,

Its wild notes seek th' ætherial plain,

Till angels, by its music fir'd,

Have, list'ning, caught th' ecstatic strain,

Have wonder'd, and admir'd.

But now secure on happier shores,

With choirs of sainted souls he sings;

His harp th' Omnipotent adores,

And from its sweet, its silver strings
Celestial music pours.

And tho' on earth no more he'll weave
The lay that's fraught with magic fire,
Yet oft shall Fancy hear at eve
His now exalted, heav'nly lyre
In sounds Æolian grieve.

B. Stoke.

JUVENIS.

VERSES

Occasioned by the Death of HENRY KIRKE WHITĖ.

WHAT is this world at best,

Tho' deckt in vernal bloom,

By hope and youthful fancy drest,
What, but a ceaseless toil for rest,
A passage to the tomb?

If flow'rets strew

The avenue,

Tho' fair, alas! how fading, and how few!

And every hour comes arm'd

By sorrow, or by woe: Conceal'd beneath its little wings,

A scythe the soft-shod pilf'rer brings,

To lay some comfort low:

Some tie t' unbind,

By love entwin'd,

Some silken bond that holds the captive mind.

And every month displays

The ravages of time:

Faded the flowers!-The Spring is past!

The scatter'd leaves, the wintry blast,

Warn to a milder clime:

The songster's flee

The leafless tree,

And bear to happier realms their melody.

Which those must shed who're doom'd to linger here.

Although a stranger, I

In friendship's train would weep:
Lost to the world, alas! so young,

And must thy lyre, in silence hung,
On the dark cypress sleep?

The poet, all

Their friend may call;

And Nature's self attends his funeral.

Altho' with feeble wing

Thy flight I would pursue,

With quicken'd zeal, with humbled pride,

Alike our object, hopes, and guide,

One heaven alike in view;

True, it was thine

To tow'r, to shine:

If Jesus own my name,

(Though fame pronounc'd it never,)
Sweet spirit, not with thee alone,
But all whose absence here I moan,

Circling with harps the golden throne,
I shall unite for ever:

At death then why

Tremble or sigh?

Oh! who would wish to live, but he who fears to die!

Dec. 5th, 1807.

JOSIAH CONDER.

SONNET,

On seeing another written to Henry Kirke White, in September 1803, inserted in his "Remains by Robert Southey."

BY ARTHUR OWEN.

AH! once again the long-left wires among,
Truants the Muse to weave her requiem song;
With sterner lore now busied, erst the lay
Cheer'd my dark morn of manhood, wont to stray
O'er fancy's fields in quest of musky flower;

To me nor fragrant less, though barr'd from view
And courtship of the world: hail'd was the hour
That gave me, dripping fresh with nature's dew,

Poor Henry's budding beauties-to a clime
Hapless transplanted, whose exotic ray

Forc'd their young vigour into transient day,
And drain'd the stalk that rear'd them! and shall time
Trample these orphan blossoms?—No! they breathe
Still lovelier charms-for Southey culls the wreath!
Oxford, Dec. 17th, 1807.

SONNET

IN MEMORY OF MR. H. K. WHITE.

""TIS now the dead of night," and I will go
To where the brook soft-murmuring glides along
In the still wood; yet does the plaintive song
Of Philomela through the welkin flow;
And while pale Cynthia carelessly doth throw

Her dewy beams the verdant boughs among,
Will sit beneath some spreading oak tree strong,
And intermingle with the streams my woe:
Hush'd in deep silence every gentle breeze;

No mortal breath disturbs the awful gloom; Cold, chilling dew-drops trickle down the trees, And every flower withholds its rich perfume: 'Tis sorrow leads me to that sacred ground Where Henry moulders in a sleep profound!

J. G.