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To a Young Lady

By nature form'd love to inspire,
To please the eye, the ear,
Thy charms, thy music all admire,
Who either see, or hear.

Thy face, where ev'ry beauty shines,
The careless eye may seize;
Thy sorm, where ev'ry grace combines,
The nicest taste may please.

Thy music charms the dullest ear,
Who cannot judge must feel;
And even they transported hear,
Who add to feeling skill.

Thus doubly form'd to gain our love,
In whom such graces meet;
What wants there more the heart to move,
And make thy pow'r complete?

To the "Bernard Barton" Schooner

Glide gently down thy native stream,
And swell thy snowy sail
Before fair April's morning beam,
And newly waken'd gale.

Thine onward course in safety keep,
By favouring breezes fann'd,
Along the billows of the deep
To Mersey's distant strand.

Thou bearest no such noble name
As all who read may know;
But one at least that well may claim
The blessing I bestow.

That name was given to honour me
By those with whom I dwell;
And cold indeed my heart would be
Did I not speed thee well.

Not all the glory those acquire,

McTavish gazed alone the lake

McTavish gazed along the lake
As if a last farewell to take.
He watched the fair moon shed her light
Refulgent on Ben Lomond's height,
And how Loch Sporran's waters gleam
Beneath her chaste and silvery beam.
Around his foot the heather springs,
The bracken too and other things,
A river's murmur fills the air
(The usual stag is drinking there)
And never, stranger, hath it been
Thy lot to view so fair a scene!

The Question

I dream'd that as I wander'd by the way
Bare Winter suddenly was changed to Spring,
And gentle odours led my steps astray,
Mix'd with a sound of waters murmuring
Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay
Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling
Its green arms round the bosom of the stream,
But kiss'd it and then fled, as Thou mightest in dream.

There grew pied wind-flowers and violets,
Daisies, those pearl'd Arcturi of the earth,
The constellated flower that never sets;
Faint oxlips; tender bluebells at whose birth

Alas! England now mourns for her poet that's gone

Alas! England now mourns for her poet that's gone—
The late and the good Lord Tennyson.
I hope his soul has fled to heaven above,
Where there is everlasting joy and love.

He was a man that didn't care for company,
Because company interfered with his study,
And confused the bright ideas in his brain,
And for that reason from company he liked to abstain.

He has written some fine pieces of poetry in his time,
Especially the May Queen, which is really sublime;
Also the gallant charge of the Light Brigade—
A most heroic poem, and beautifully made.

Translation from Petrarch

LXXIII

Mine old dear en'my, my froward master,
Afore that Queen I caused to be accited
Which holdeth the divine part of nature,
That like as gold in fire he might be tried.
Charged with dolour, there I me presented
With horrible fear, as one that greatly dreadeth
A wrongful death and justice alway seeketh.

And thus I said: ‘Once my left foot, Madam,
When I was young I set within his reign;
Whereby other than fierily burning flame
I never felt, but many a grievous pain.
Torment I suffered, anger and disdain,

The Koocoo

In Aprill the koocoo can sing her song by rote,
In June of tune she cannot sing a note.
At first koo-coo, koo-coo, sing shrill can she do,
At last, kooke, kooke, kooke; six kookes to one koo.

That Night

You and I, and that night, with its perfume and glory!—
The scent of the locusts—the light of the moon;
And the violin weaving the waltzers a story,
Enmeshing their feet in the weft of the tune,
Till their shadows uncertain
Reeled round on the curtain,
While under the trellis we drank in the June.

Soaked through with the midnight the cedars were sleeping,
Their shadowy tresses outlined in the bright
Crystal, moon-smitten mists, where the fountain's heart, leaping
Forever, forever burst, full with delight;
And its lisp on my spirit
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