When desolated countries, towns on fire, Are but the avowed attire

Of warfare waged with desperate mind Against the life of virtue in mankind; Assaulting without ruth

The citadels of truth; While the whole forest of civility Is doomed to perish, to the last fair tree

A crouching purpose—a distracted will— Opposed to hopes that battened upon scorn, And to desires whose ever-waxing horn Not all the light of earthly power could fill; Opposed to dark, deep plots of patient And to celerities of lawless force (skill, Which, spurning God, had flung away [redress? What could they gain but shadows of So bad proceeded propagating worse; And discipline was passion's dire excess. Widens the fatal web, its lines extend,* And deadlier poisons in the chalice blendWhen will your trials teach you to be wise?

remorse

Oh, prostrate lands, consult your agonies!

No more-the guilt is banished,
And, with the guilt, the shame is fled;
And, with the guilt and shame, the woe
hath vanished,

Shaking the dust and ashes from her head!
No more-these lingerings of distress
Sully the limpid stream of thankfulness.
What robe can gratitude employ
So seemly as the radiant vest of joy?
What steps so suitable as those that move
In prompt obedience to spontaneous mea-
Of glory-and felicity-and love, [sures
Surrendering the whole heart to sacred
pleasures?

Imagination, ne'er before content,
But aye ascending, restless in her pride,
From all that man's performance could
present,

Stoops to that closing deed magnificent, And with the embrace is satisfied. Fly, ministers of fame, Whate'er your means, whatever help ye claim, [delight! Bear through the world these tidings of Hours, days, and months, have borne them, in the sight [shower, Of mortals, travelling faster than the That landward stretches from the sea, The morning's splendours to devour ; But this appearance scattered ecstasy, And heart-sick Europe blessed the healing power.

The shock is given-the adversaries bleed

Lo, justice triumphs! Earth is freed! Such glad assurance suddenly went forthIt pierced the caverns of the sluggish

north

Of Andes-frozen gulfs became its bridge-
It found no barrier on the ridge
The vast Pacific gladdens with the freight-
Upon the lakes of Asia 'tis bestowed-
The Arabian desert shapes a willing road,
Across her burning breast,
For this refreshing incense from the west!
Where snakes and lions breed,
Where towns and cities thick as stars
appear,

Wherever fruits are gathered, and where'er The upturned soil receives the hopeful seed

of night

The unwearied arrow hath pursued its flight! [heed, The eyes of good men thankfully give And in its sparkling progress read How virtue triumphs, from her bondage freed!

Tyrants exult to hear of kingdoms won, And slaves are pleased to learn that mighty feats are done; [tracted borders Even the proud realm, from whose disThis messenger of good was launched in air, [disorders,

France, conquered France, amid her wild Feels, and hereafter shall the truth declare, That she too lacks not reason to rejoice, And utter England's name with sadlyplausive voice.

Preserve, O Lord! within our hearts The memory of thy favour, That else insensibly departs, And loses its sweet savour! Lodge it within us!—as the power of light Lives inexhaustibly in precious gems, Fixed on the front of eastern diadems, So shine our thankfulness for ever bright! What offering, what transcendent monuShall our sincerity to thee present? [ment Not work of hands; but trophies that may

reach

To highest heaven--the labour of the soul;
That builds, as thy unerring precepts teach,
Upon the inward victories of each,
Her hope of lasting glory for the whole.
Yet might it well become that city now,
Into whose breast the tides of grandeur
flow,

To whom all persecuted men retreat;
If a new temple lift her votive brow
Upon the shore of silver Thames-to greet
The peaceful guest advancing from afar.
Bright be the distant fabric, as a star
Fresh risen-and beautiful within !-there

meet

Dependence infinite, proportion just;

A pile that grace approves, that time can

trust

With his most sacred wealth, heroic dust!

But if the valiant of this land In reverential modesty demand, That all observance, due to them, be paid Where their serene progenitors are laid; Kings, warriors, high-souled poets, saintlike sages, [ages; England's illustrious sons of long, long

Within the circuit of those Gothic walls,
Shall be performed at pregnant intervals ;
Commemoration holy, that unites
The living generations with the dead;
By the deep soul-moving sense
Of religious eloquence,-

By visual pomp, and by the tie
Of sweet and threatening harmony;
Soft notes, awful as the omen
Of destructive tempests coming,
And escaping from that sadness
Into elevated gladness;
While the

tendant,

white-robed choir at

Yea, Carnage is thy daughter! Thou cloth'st the wicked in their dazzling mail,

And by thy just permission they prevail; Thine arm from peril guards the

coasts

Of them who in thy laws delight:
Thy presence turns the scale of doubtful
fight,
Tremendous God of battles, Lord of Hosts!
TO THEE-TO THEE-
On this appointed day shall thanks ascend,
That Thou hast brought our warfare to an
end,

And that we need no second victory!
Ha! what a ghastly ight for man to see;
And to the heavenly saints in peace who
dwell,

For a brief moment, terrible;
But to thy sovereign penetration, fair,
Before whom all things are, that were,
All judgments that have been, or e'er
shall be ;

Links in the chain of thy tranquillity! Along the bosom of this favoured nation, Breathe thou, this day, a vital undulation!

Let all who do this land inherit Be conscious of thy moving spirit! Oh, 'tis a goodly ordinance, -the sight, Though sprung from bleeding war, is one of pure delight;

Bless thou the hour, or ere the hour arrive, When a whole people hall kneel down in

The drops that tip the melting icicles.

Oh, enter now His temple gate! Inviting words-perchance already flung, (As the crowd press devoutly down the aisle

Of some old minster's venerable pile) From voices into zealous passion stung, While the tubed engine feels the inspiring blast, [cast And has begun-its clouds of sound to Towards the empyreal heaven,

As if the fretted roof were riven.
Us, humbler ceremonies now await;
But in the bosom, with devout respect,
The banner of our joy we will erect,
And strength of love our souls shall
elevate:

For to a few collected in his name,
Their heavenly Father will incline an ear
Gracious to service hallowed by its aim ;-
Awake! the majesty of God revere !

Go-and with foreheads meekly bowed Present your prayers-go-and rejoice aloud

The Holy One will hear! And what 'mid silence deep, with faith sincere,

Ye, in your low and undisturbed estate,
Shall simply feel and purely meditate
Of warnings-from the unprecedented
might,
[closed;
Which, in our time, the impious have dis-
And of more arduous duties thence im-
posed

Upon the future advocates of right;
Of mysteries revealed,

And judgments unrepealed,-
Of earthly revolution,

And final retribution,

To his omniscience will appear An offering not unworthy to find place, On this high DAY of THANKS, before the

Throne of Grace!

Against the injuries of time, the spite
Of fortune, and the desolating storms
Of future war. Advance not-spare to hide,
O gentle power of darkness!-these mild
hues;

Obscure not yet these silent avenues

Of stateliest architecture, where the forms Of nun-like females, with soft motion glide!

of it in lines which I cannot deny myself the
pleasure of connecting with my own:-
"Time hath not wronged her, nor hath ruin
sought

Rudely her splendid structures to destroy,
Save in those recent days, with evil fraught,
Triumphant, and from all restraint released,
When mutability, in drunken joy
Let loose her fierce and many-headed beast.

"But for the scars in that unhappy rage
Inflicted, firm she stands and undecayed;
Like our first sires, a beautiful old age

Is hers in venerable years arrayed;
And yet, to her, benignant stars may bring,
What fate denies to man, a second spring.

"When I may read of tilts in days of old,

And tourneys graced by chieftains of renown, Fair dames, grave citizens, and warriors bold, Which for such pomp fit theatre should be, If fancy would portray some stately town, Fair Brugès, I shall then remember thee."

In this city are many vestiges of the splendour of the Burgundian dukedom; and the long black mantle universally worn by the females is probably a remnant of the old Spanish connexion, which, if I do not much deceive myself, is trace

able in the grave deportment of its inhabitants. Bruges is comparatively little disturbed by that curious contest, or rather conflict, of Flemish with French propensities in matters of taste, so conspicuous through other parts of Flanders. The hotel to which we drove at Ghent furnished an odd instance. In the passages were paintings and statues, after the antique, of Hebe and Apollo; and in the garden a little pond, about a yard and a half in diameter, with a weeping willow bending over it, and under the shade of that tree, in the centre of the pond, a wooden painted statue of a Dutch or Flemish boor, looking ineffably tender upon his mistress, and embracing her. A living duck, tethered at the feet of the statues, alternately tormented a miserable eel and itself with endeavours to escape from its bonds and prison. Had we chanced to espy the hostess of the hotel in this quaint rural retreat, the exhibition would have been complete. She was a true Flemish figure, in the dress of the days of Holbein,-her symbol of office a weighty bunch of keys, pendent from her portly waist. In Brussels, the modern taste in costume, architecture, etc., has got the mastery; in Ghent there is a struggle; but in Bruges old images are still paramount, and an air of monastic life among the quiet goings-on of a thinly-peopled city is inexpressibly soothing; a pensive grace seems to be cast over all, even the very children. -Extract from Journal.

SCENERY BETWEEN NAMUR AND LIEGE. WHAT lovelier home could gentle fancy choose? [and plains, Is this the stream, whose cities, heights, War's favourite playground, are with crimson stains

Familiar, as the morn with pearly dews? The morn, that now, along the silver Meuse, Spreading her peaceful ensigns, calls the [swains To tend their silent boats and ringing Or strip the bough whose mellow fruit wains, [bestrews The ripening corn beneath it. As mine eyes Turn from the fortified and threatening hill, How sweet the prospect of yon watery glade, [shade,

With its gray rocks clustering in pensive From the smooth meadow ground, serene That, shaped like old monastic turrets, rise and still!