XX. WRITTEN IN A BLANK LEAF OF MACPHERSON'S OSSIAN. OFT have I caught from fitful breeze Fragments of far-off melodies, With ear not coveting the whole, Nor felt a wish that Heaven would show The image of its perfect bow. What need, then, of these finished Strains? Away with counterfeit Remains! An abbey in its lone recess, A temple of the wilderness, Wrecks though they be, announce with feeling The majesty of honest dealing. Spirit of Ossian! if imbound In language thou may'st yet be found, If aught (intrusted to the pen Or floating on the tongues of Men, Albeit shattered and impaired) In concert with memorial claim Of old grey stone, and high-born name, Where moans the blast, or beats the wave, And for presumptuous wrongs atone; Time is not blind; - yet He, who spares Of the poetic ecstasy Into the land of mystery. No tongue is able to rehearse One measure, Orpheus! of thy verse; 1 Is, for the dwellers upon earth, Mute as a Lark ere morning's birth. Why grieve for these, though passed away Have sunk, at Nature's call; or strayed Frantic else how might they rejoice? And friendless, by their own sad choice. Hail, Bards of mightier grasp! on you Who cast not off the acknowledged guide, Privation, under sorrow thrive; In whom the fiery Muse revered The symbol of a snow-white beard, Dropped from the lenient cloud of years. Brothers in Soul! though distant times, Produced you, nursed in various climes, Ye, when the orb of life had waned, A plenitude of love retained; Hence, while in you each sad regret By corresponding hope was met, Ye lingered among human kind, Sweet voices for the passing wind; Departing sunbeams, loth to stop, Though smiling on the last hill top! Such to the tender-hearted Maid Such Milton, to the fountain head Of Glory by Urania led! XXI. VERNAL ODE. "Rerum Natura tota est nusquam magis quam in minimis. Plin. Nat. Hist. " 1. BENEATH the concave of an April sky, When all the fields with freshest green were dight, The form and rich habiliments of One Whose countenance bore resemblance to the sun, When it reveals, in evening majesty, Features half lost amid their own pure light. He hung, — then floated with angelic ease (Softening that bright effulgence by degrees) Till he had reached a summit sharp and bare, Where oft the vent'rous heifer drinks the noon-tide breeze. Upon the apex of that lofty cone Alighted, there the Stranger stood alone; Fair as a gorgeous Fabric of the East |