Bowles, in describing a night-scene (in his Grave of the last The following from an address to the North Star has rather more vigour than Mrs. Smith usually displays: "Now nightly wandering 'mid the tempests drear Through the swift clouds-driven by the wind along; O'er whose wild stream the gust of Winter raves, The following verse is tender and melodious :-- "Oh! my lost love! no tomb is placed for thee And no memorial but this breaking heart!" I quote a part of the Sonnet to Fancy, for the sake of the neat turn of its concluding couplet : "Through thy false medium then no longer viewed, May fancied pain and fancied pleasure fly; And I, as from me all thy dreams depart, Be to my wayward destiny subdued; Nor seek perfection with a poet's eye, Nor suffer anguish with a poet's heart." It may perhaps appear from these extracts, that though not to be placed in the first class of British Female Poets, Mrs. Smith deserves more attention from the public than she is now likely to obtain. She is not to be compared to the Lady Minstrels of the present day, (to the powerful Joanna Baillie, the fanciful L. E. L., the tender and pathetic Caroline Bowles*, or the refined and spirited Hemans,) but her poems may, nevertheless, be occasionally referred to with pleasure as the effusions of a chaste and cultivated mind. EVENING CLOUDS. [A FRAGMENT.] A GLORIOUS Sight! The sun is in the sea, And shadowy form that charms the poet's eye Now Mrs. Southey. RETROSPECTIONS. [WRITTEN IN INDIA.] 1. 'Tis sweet on this far strand, When memory charms the fond reverted eye, To view that hallowed land Where early dreams like sun-touched shadows lie! II. The dear familiar forms, That caught the fairest hues of happier hours, Flash forth through after storms, As bursts of light between autumnal showers. III. The green-wood's loveliest spot The summer walk-the cheerful winter fire The calm domestic cot The village church with ivy-covered spire IV. Each scene we loved so well With faithful force the mind's true mirror shows; As Painting's mighty spell Recals the past, and lengthened life bestows. V. But though so brightly beam, These distant views, they make the present drear; By Youth's departed dream, Life's onward paths but desolate appear. VI. We may not therefore dwell Too long and deeply on the dearer past, Of pleasures gone and glories overcast. VII. Whate'er our lot may be, Whatever tints life's varied prospects wear, From sullen apathy or fierce despair. VIII. In fortune's cloudiest hours, Within the dreariest regions of the earth, IX. For still, where'er we range, Are traced the sweet results of virtue's reign; X. And he, whose spirit glows At Nature's charms, shall own in every Her glorious aspect shows land The same bright marks of God's creating hand! FAIR England! thine untravell'd sons may bear As those who ne'er have parted from their birth SONNET-FREEDOM*. THERE is exulting pride, and holy mirth, In Freedom's kindling eye! Her radiant smile The springs of thought and feeling in their birth, * Written in England. |