Whose glory, though distant, they long had

adored,

Whose name often hallow'd the juice of their board!

And still as, with sympathy humble but true,
I told them each luminous trait that I knew,

They have listen'd, and sigh'd that the powerful

stream

Of America's empire should pass, like a dream, Without leaving one fragment of genius, to say How sublime was the tide which had vanish'd

away!

Farewell to the few-though we never may meet
On this planet again, it is soothing and sweet
To think that, whenever my song or my name
Shall recur to their ear, they'll recal me the same
I have been to them now, young, unthoughtful,
and blest,

Ere hope had deceived me or sorrow depress'd!

But, DOUGLAS! while thus I endear to my mind The elect of the land we shall soon leave behind, I can read in the weather-wise glance of thine eye, As it follows the rack flitting over the sky,

That the faint coming breeze will be fair for our

flight,

And shall steal us away ere the falling of night. Dear DOUGLAS! thou knowest, with thee by my side, With thy friendship to soothe me, thy courage to guide,

There is not a bleak isle in those summerless seas, Where the day comes in darkness, or shines but to freeze,

Not a tract of the line, not a barbarous shore, That I could not with patience, with pleasure explore!

Oh! think then how happy I follow thee now, When hope smooths the billowy path of our

prow,

And each prosperous sigh of the west-springing

wind

Takes me nearer the home where my heart is inshrined;

Where the smile of a father shall meet me again, And the tears of a mother turn bliss into pain; Where the kind voice of sisters shall steal to my heart,

And ask it, in sighs, how we ever could part!

But see!-the bent top-sails are ready to swellTo the boat-I am with thee-Columbia, farewell!

TO LADY H

ON AN OLD RING FOUND AT TUNBRIDGE-WELLS.

"Tunnebrige est à la même distance de Londres que Fontainebleau l'est de Paris. Ce qu'il y a de beau et de galant dans l'un et dans l'autre sexe s'y rassemble au temps des La compagnie," etc. etc.

eaux.

See Mémoires de Grammont, seconde part. chap. iii.

TUNBRIDGE-WELLS, August, 1805.

WHEN Grammont graced these happy springs,
And Tunbridge saw, upon her Pantiles,
The merriest wight of all the kings

That ever ruled these gay, gallant isles ;

Like us, by day they rode, they walk'd,
At eve they did as we may do,

And Grammont just like Spencer talk'd,
And lovely Stewart smiled like you!

The only different trait is this,

That woman then, if man beset her,

Because, as yet, she knew no better!

Each night they held a coterie,

Where, every fear to slumber charm'd, Lovers were all they ought to be,

And husbands not the least alarm'd!

They call'd up all their school-day pranks,
Nor thought it much their sense beneath
To play at riddles, quips, and cranks,

And lords show'd wit, and ladies teeth.

As-"Why are husbands like the Mint?
Because, forsooth, a husband's duty
Is just to set the name and print

"Like a young widow, fresh and fair?" Because it wants some hand to raise

The weeds, which "have no business there!

And thus they miss'd and thus they hit,

And now they struck and now they parried, And some lay-in of full-grown wit,

While others of a pun miscarried.

VOL. II.

13

'Twas one of those facetious nights

That Grammont gave this forfeit ring,
For breaking grave conundrum rites,
Or punning ill, or—some such thing;

From whence it can be fairly traced
Through many a branch and many a bough,
From twig to twig, until it graced
The snowy hand that wears it now.

All this I'll prove, and then-to you,
Oh Tunbridge! and your springs ironical,
I swear by H-thc-te's eye of blue,
To dedicate the important chronicle.

Long may your ancient inmates give
Their mantles to your modern lodgers,
And Charles' loves in H-thc-te live,
And Charles' bards revive in Rogers!

Let no pedantic fools be there,

For ever be those fops abolish'd, With heads as wooden as thy ware,

And, Heaven knows! not half so polish'd.

But still receive the mild, the gay,

The few, who know the rare delight