The Dutch came o'er the ocean, As if it were their home, With a slow and gliding motion The stately vessels come. The sky is blue above them, But ere an hour be past, The shadows of the battle Will over heaven be cast. They meet-it is in thunder, The thunder of the gun; Fire rends the smoke asunder The battle is begun. He stands amid his seamen, Our Admiral of the White, And guides the strife more calmly, Than of that strife I write. For over the salt water The grape-shot sweeps around; The decks are red with slaughter, The dead are falling round. But the bold flag of old England The Dutch take down their colours, From that hour victorious Have we kept the seas, And our navy glorious, Queens it o'er the breeze. Long may we keep such empire, It is a noble debt We owe to those past triumphs, We never may forget. All generous feelings nursed the love But better had she shared the doom, Proud-beautiful-she boweth down She will command herself, and bear All lofty thoughts and dreams; Why did she love? Alas, such cnoice Once must she love, and on that cast But this world has no other hope, CAFES IN DAMASCUS.* "And Mahomet turned aside, and would not enter the fair city: 'It is,' said he, 'too delicious." " REBECCA. SHE looketh on the glittering scene The shadow of the wakening heart The heart that is a woman's world, Which coloureth with itself her cares, * The victory over the Dutch was won by Admiral Blake in the time of the Protectorate. Van Tromp sailed into the channel with a broom at his mast head, intimating that he would sweep the seas of the English. The result is stated above. LANGUIDLY the night wind bloweth From the gardens round, Where the clear Barrada floweth With a lulling sound. Not the lute note's sweetest shiver As is on a wandering river, * The cafes are perhaps the greatest luxury that a stranger finds in Damascus. Gardens, kiosques, fountains, and groves are abundant around every Eastern capital; but cafes on the very bosom of a rapid river, and bathed by its waves, are peculiar to this ancient city: they are formed so as to exclude the rays of the sun while they admit the breeze, There the Moslem leaneth, dreaming O'er the inward world, While around the fragrant steaming Of the smoke is curl'd. Rising from the coffee berry, Dark grape of the South; Or the pipe of polish'd cherry, With its amber mouth. Cool'd by passing through the water, By that Rose's spirit haunted Of far lands, and lives enchanted, Thus, with some sweet dream's assistance, SIR ROBERT PEEL. Mrs. Hemans' last hours were cheered by the kindness of Sir Robert Peel; and the letter promising an appointment to her eldest son, was one of the latest that she received. This fact is my excuse for having deviated from my general rule of leaving cotemporary portraits to speak for themselves. I frankly confess that I can never write till interested in my subjects. Now, a female writer cannot pretend to even an opinion on the political and public characters of the day. The above incident, on the con trary, belongs to the many who look back with admiration and gratitude to the gifted and the gone. DIM through the curtains came the purple twilight slowly, Deepening like death's shadow around that silent room; There lay a head, a radiant head, but lowly, And the pale face like a statue shone out amid the THE DELECTABLE MOUNTAINS. Fair Morning! lend thy wings, and let me fly Where tears are wiped away from every eye. I'm sick with the heart's want; To cling to things less transient than its flowers. I ask of the still night-it answers me, This earth is not my home: A wanderer and a penitent, to 'Thee! Ye far, fair mountains, echo with my cry, CEMETERY OF THE SMOLENSKO CHURCH.* THEY gather, with the summer in their hands, The summer from their distant valleys bringing; They gather round the church in pious bands, With funeral array, and solemn singing. The dead are their companions; many days Have past since they were laid to their last slumber; And in the hurry of life's crowded ways, But now the past comes back again, and death The mother kneeleth at a little tomb, Friend thinks on friend; and youth comes back * The Cemetery of the Smolensko Church is situated about two versts from Petersburgh, on one of the islands on the mouth of the Neva, and less than quarter of a mile from the gulf of Finland. The curious ceremony alluded to, takes place yearly, when the Russians gather from all parts, to scatter flowers on the graves, and to mourn above the dead, and afterwards proceed to regale them selves with soup, fruit of all kinds, and wine; in many instances spreading their cloths on the very graves over which they had been bitterlv mourning. It is a superstitious rite and old, LINCOLN CATHEDRAL.* 'Twas the deep forest bodied forth that fane, So rose the arches of the old oak trees, So wreath'd the close set branches at their side, So through the open spaces gleam'd the sun; While like an anthem sang the morning birds. All nature teacheth worship unto man, And the first instinct of the heart is faith. Those carved aisles, so noble in their state, So graceful in each exquisite device, Are of the past; a rude and barbarous past, And yet they rose to heaven. Though the red sword Flash'd in the sun, and with unholy flash Cross Still sanctifies its merciful domain. THE SACRED SHRINES OF DWARKA. SUCH was the faith of old-obscure and vast, * It is curious to observe how much the aspect of nature has in every country given its aspect to architecture. The colossal proportions of Indian scenery have not inore given their likeness to the vast temples of the Hindoos, than our own northern forests have given their own character to the Gothic cathedral. † The introduction of Christian missionaries was always advocated by Sir Alexander Johnston, while President of His Majesty's Council in Ceylon. A leading Brahmin mentioned, while in conversation with him, the following striking fact. "For our toleration," said he, "I refer to SONG OF THE SIRENS.* HITHER, famed Ulysses, steer, Pass not, pride of Greece, along To our haven come and hear, Come and hear the Sirens' song. Never did a sable bark Here the seamen, loath to part, Well we know each gallant deed the little Roman Catholic chapel of St. Francis, which had for the last three hundred years stood under a banyan tree, close by the great Hindoo temple. Not one of the innumerable devotees who resort thither on pilgrimages had ever molested the shrine of another faith." * The original verses, eight in number, from which the above song is rather imitated than translated, are perfect models of harmony. They are generally supposed to give Homer's own idea of what an epic poem should be-bland and conciliatory in its opening, but at the same time expressing a thorough consciousness that the poet had the power of doing that which would make all ears listen. Ulysses wandering by, in his "winged pines," as Browne phrases it, is accosted in words of gentle accent, but the Sirens take care to tell him that, much praised and deservedly honoured as he is, he must listen to their song, for never yet had man heard them sing, without being subdued. The poet proceeds to promise, that sweetness of melody is to mark the flowing numbers of his lay, and that in the honied song are to be conveyed lessons of wisdom. The sailor, they say, dwells here delighted and filled with ampler knowledge. Such are the general promises, but as, after all, we must come to the particular incidents of human life-the soaring poem is to relate whatever is most spirit-stirring, most heart-moving, most thought-awakening in the doings of men. We must not hear of mere abstractions-we must have names and deeds interesting to every bosom; and we must be shown, too, that these deeds are regulated by powers above human control. The Sirens, therefore, announce that they shall sing of the most renowned event of their time, those wars and battles which took place before the wind swept towers of Ilion,"events to which he to whom they were sung had so mainly contributed, and which were done by the impulse of the gods. Such is the lay, continues the poet, I am about to pour into your ear; and that it may be done with every certainty of affecting all whose intellect or whose feeling can be approached in tone not to be resisted, I, the minstrel, (we, say the Sirens, but it is Homer, the one Homer, who speaks,) come to my task prepared with long-stored knowledge of all that can concern mankind. "We know all that is done upon the fertile bosom of earth." Such is the ancient interpretation of the song of the Sirens. It may, perhaps, be fanciful, but those who consider the song with care will find that there is much in the comment, and will, at all events, agree that the poet who wrote the verses has fulfilled the conditions. When from the carved lattice Like some pleasant book; And her cheek is white, Human heart this history THE LAKE OF COMO. AGAIN I am beside the lake, I see the quiet evening lights Amid the distant mountains shine; I hear the music of a lute, It used to come from thine. How can another sing the song, The sweet sad song that was thine own? It is alike, yet not the same, It has not caught thy tone. Ah, never other lip may catch The sweetness round thine own that clung; To me there is a tone unheard, There is a chord unstrung. Thou loveliest lake, I sought thy shores, I find the folly of the search, Thou bringest but half the past again; Too real the memories that haunt I did not ask to think. False beauty haunting still my heart, Fair lake, it is all vain to seek THE PRINCESS VICTORIA. A FAIR young face o'er which is only cast A little while hast thou to be a child, Thy face is very fair, thine eyes are mild, Change is upon the world, it may be thine To make thy throne a beacon and a shrine There is much misery on this won earth, But much that may be spared; Of great and generous thought there is no dearth, The wind that bears our flag from soil to soil, It carries in its breath a summer spoil, Thou, royal child, the future is thine own, May it be bless'd in thee! May peace that smiles on all be round thy throne, And universal truth, whose light alone (Gives golden records unto history. A DUTCH INTERIOR. THEY were poor, and by their cabin, On one side, the fierce ocean Proclaim'd perpetual war; On the other, mighty nations Were threatening from afar. Foes and seas denied a footing, They made the sea defender Of the lately threaten'd shore, And their tall and stately vessels Sail'd the conquer'd waters o'er. To the poor and scanty cabin, Dyke by dyke they beat their enemies, As they had beat the sea; Till Faith stood by her altar, * The brilliant theory of a republic has never been reduced to more rational practice than in the history of Holland. Commerce, religious toleration, security of life and property, and universal instruction-these have been the principles of the states from the very first. Liberty can have no securer foundations. We know of nothing finer in all history, than their unequal but triumphant struggle with le Grand Mmarque. The spirit which animated the |