THE EVER-GREEN.

WHEN tepid breezes fann'd the air,
And violets perfum'd the glade,
Pensive and grave my charming fair
Beneath yon shady lime was laid.

Flourish, said I, those favour'd boughs,
And ever sooth the purest flames!
Witness to none but faithful vows!
Wounded by none but faithful names!

Yield ev'ry tree that crowns the grove
To this which pleas'd my wand'ring dear!
Range where you will, ye bands of love,
Ye still shall seem to revel here.

Lavinia smil'd-and whilst her arm
Her fair reclining head sustain'd,
Betray'd she felt some fresh alarm;

And thus the meaning smile explain'd:

"When summer suns shine forth no more, Will then this lime its shelter yield? Protect us when the tempests roar,

And winter drives us from the field?

"Yet faithful then the fir shall last

I smile," she cry'd, "but ah! I tremble, To think when my fair season's past, Which Damon then will most resemble."

THE ANSWER.

Too tim'rous maid, can time or chance
A pure ingenuous flame controul?
O lay aside that tender glance,

That melts my frame, that kills my soul.

Were but thy outward charms admir'd,
Frail origin of female sway!
My flame, like other flames inspir'd,
Might then like other flames decay :

But whilst thy mind shall seem thus fair,
Thy soul's unfading charms be seen,
Thou may'st resign that shape and air,
Yet find thy swain—an ever-green.

THE PLAY-THING CHANGED.

KITTY's charming voice and face,
Syren-like, first caught my fancy;
Wit and humour next take place,
And now I doat on sprightly Nancy.

Kitty tunes her pipe in vain,

With airs most languishing and dying;

Calls me false, ungrateful swain,
And tries in vain to shoot me flying.

Nancy, with resistless art,

Always humorous, gay, and witty, Has talk'd herself into my heart, And quite excluded tuneful Kitty.

Ah, Kitty! Love, a wanton boy,

Now pleas'd with song, and now with prattle,

Still longing for the newest toy,

Has chang'd his whistle for a rattle.

CYNTHIA.

AN ELEGIAC POEM.

BENEATH an aged oak's embow'ring shade,
Whose spreading arms with grey moss fringed were,
Around whose trunk the clasping ivy stray'd,
A love-lorn youth oft pensive would repair.

Fast by, a Naiad taught her stream to glide,
Which through the dale a silent channel wore;
The silver willow deck'd its verdant side,

The whisp'ring sedges wav'd along the shore.

Here oft, when morn peep'd o'er the dusky hill;
Here oft, when eve bedew'd the misty vale;
Careless he laid him all beside the rill,

And pour'd in strains like these his artless tale:

Ah! would he say—and then a sigh would heave:
Ah, Cynthia! sweeter than the breath of morn,
Soft as the gentle breath that fans at eve,
Of thee bereft, how shall I live forlorn?

Ah! what avails this sweetly solemn bow'r,

That silent stream where dimpling eddies play; Yon thymy bank bedeck'd with many a flow'r, Where maple tufts exclude the beam of day?

Robb'd of my love, for how can these delight,
Though lavish Spring her smile around has cast?
Despair, alas! that whelms the soul in night,
Dims the sad eye, and deadens ev'ry taste.

As droops the lily at the blighting gale;

Or crimson-spotted cowslip of the mead, Whose tender stalk (alas! their stalk so frail)

Some hasty foot hath bruis'd with heedless tread:

As droops the woodbine, when some village hind
Hath fell'd the sapling elm it fondly bound;
No more it gadding dances in the wind,

But trails its fading beauties on the ground:

So droops my soul, dear maid, downcast and sad,
For ever! ah! for ever torn from thee;
Bereft of each sweet hope, which once it had,
When love, when treach'rous love, first smil'd on me.

Return blest days, return ye laughing hours, Which led me up the roseate steep of youth; Which strew'd my simple path with vernal flow'rs, And bade me court chaste science and fair truth.

Ye know, the curling breeze, or gilded fly
That idly wantons in the noon-tide air,
Was not so free, was not so gay as I,

For ah! I knew not then or love, or care.