SONNET.

LET me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments: love is not love,
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove;
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,

That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be

taken.

THOU HAST SWORN BY THY GOD, MY
JEANIE.

THOU hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie,
By that pretty white hand o' thine,
And by a' the lowing stars in heaven,
That thou wad aye be mine!
And I hae sworn by my God, my Jeanie,
And by that kind heart o' thine,
By a' the stars sown thick owre heaven,
That thou shalt aye be mine!

Then foul fa' the hands that wad loose sic bands,
And the heart that wad part sic luve !
But there's nae hand can loose the band,
But the finger o' God abuve.
Though the wee, wee cot maun be my bield,
An' my claithing ne'er sae mean,

I wad lap me up rich i' the faulds o' luve,
Heaven's armfu' o' my Jean!

Her white arm wad be a pillow to me,

Fu' safter than the down;

--

ADAM DESCRIBING EVE. FROM "PARADISE LOST," BOOK VIII.

MINE eyes he closed, but open left the cell
Of fancy, my internal sight, by which
Abstract, as in a trance, methought I saw,
Though sleeping, where I lay, and saw the shape
Still glorious before whom awake I stood;
Who, stooping, opened my left side, and took
From thence a rib, with cordial spirits warm,
And life-blood streaming fresh; wide was the
wound,

But suddenly with flesh filled up and healed:
The rib he formed and fashioned with his hands;
Under his forming hands a creature grew,
Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair,
That what seemed fair in all the world seemed

now

Mean, or in her summed up, in her contained
And in her looks, which from that time infused
Sweetness into my heart, unfelt before,
And into all things from her air inspired
The spirit of love and amorous delight.
She disappeared, and left me dark; I waked
To find her, or forever to deplore
Her loss, and other pleasures all abjure:
When out of hope, behold her, not far off,
Such as I saw her in my dream, adorned
With what all earth or Heaven could bestow
To make her amiable. On she came,
Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen,
And guided by his voice, nor uninformed
Of nuptial sanctity and marriage rites:
Grace was in all her steps, Heaven in her eye,
In every gesture dignity and love.
I, overjoyed, could not forbear aloud :

"This turn hath made amends; thou hast fulfilled

Thy words, Creator bounteous and benign,
Giver of all things fair, but fairest this
Of all thy gifts, nor enviest. I now see
Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, myself
Before me; Woman is her name, of man
Extracted for this cause he shall forego
Father and mother, and to his wife adhere;
And they shall be one flesh, one heart, one soul."
She heard me thus, and though divinely
brought,

Yet innocence and virgin modesty,

Her virtue and the conscience of her worth,
That would be wooed, and not unsought be won,
Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired,
The more desirable; or, to say all,

Nature herself, though pure of sinful thought,
Wrought in her so, that, seeing me, she turned;
I followed her; she what was honor knew,
And with obsequious majesty approved
My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bower

I led her blushing like the morn: all Heaven,
And happy constellations on that hour
Shed their selectest influence; the earth
Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill ;
Joyous the birds; fresh gales and gentle airs
Whispered it to the woods, and from their wings
Flung rose, flung odors from the spicy shrub,
Disporting, till the amorous bird of night
Sung spousal, and bid haste the evening star
On his hill-top, to light the bridal lamp.

When I approach

Her loveliness, so absolute she seems,
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own, that what she wills to do or say
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best;
All higher knowledge in her presence falls
Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her
Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows;
Authority and reason on her wait,
As one intended first, not after made
Occasionally; and, to consummate all,
Greatness of mind and nobleness their seat
Build in her loveliest, and create an awe
About her, as a guard angelic placed.

TO A LADY BEFORE MARRIAGE. O, FORMED by Nature, and refined by Art, With charms to win, and sense to fix the heart! By thousands sought, Clotilda, canst thou free Thy crowd of captives and descend to me? Content in shades obscure to waste thy life, A hidden beauty and a country wife? O, listen while thy summers are my theme! Ah! soothe thy partner in his waking dream! In some small hamlet on the lonely plain, Where Thames through meadows rolls his mazy train,

Or where high Windsor, thick with greens arrayed,

Waves his old oaks, and spreads his ample shade,
Fancy has figured out our calm retreat;
Already round the visionary seat

Our limes begin to shoot, our flowers to spring,
The brooks to murmur, and the birds to sing.

Where dost thou lie, thou thinly peopled green,
Thou nameless lawn, and village yet unseen,
Where sons, contented with their native ground,
Ne'er travelled further than ten furlongs round,
And the tanned peasant and his ruddy bride
Were born together, and together died,
Where early larks best tell the morning light,
And only Philomel disturbs the night?
Midst gardens here my humble pile shall rise,
With sweets surrounded of ten thousand dyes;
All savage where the embroidered gardens end,
The haunt of echoes, shall my woods ascend;
And oh if Heaven the ambitious thought ap-
prove,

A rill shall warble 'cross the gloomy grove,
A little rill, o'er pebbly beds conveyed,
Gush down the steep, and glitter through the
glade.

hale!

How loud that heifer lows from yonder vale! That thrush how shrill! his note so clear, so high,

He drowns each feathered minstrel of the sky.
Here let me trace beneath the purpled morn
The deep-mouthed beagle and the sprightly horn,
Or lure the trout with well-dissembled flies,
Or fetch the fluttering partridge from the skies.
Nor shall thy hand disdain to crop the vine,
The downy peach, or flavored nectarine;
Or rob the beehive of its golden hoard,
And bear the unbought luxuriance to thy board.
Sometimes my books by day shall kill the hours,
While from thy needle rise the silken flowers,
And thou, by turns, to ease my feeble sight,
Resume the volume, and deceive the night.
O, when I mark thy twinkling eyes opprest,
Soft whispering, let me warn my love to rest;
Then watch thee, charmed, while sleep locks

every sense,

And to sweet Heaven commend thy innocence.
Thus reigned our fathers o'er the rural fold,
Wise, hale, and honest, in the days of old;
Till courts arose, where substance pays for show,
And specious joys are bought with real woe.

THOMAS TICKELL.

THE NIGHT BEFORE THE WEDDING; OR, TEN YEARS AFTER.

THE Country ways are full of mire,

The boughs toss in the fading light, The winds blow out the sunset's fire,

And sudden droppeth down the night. I sit in this familiar room,

Where mud-splashed hunting squires resort; My sole companion in the gloom

This slowly dying pint of port.

The man who knew, while he was young,
Some soft and soul-subduing air,
Melts when again he hears it sung,

Although 't is only half so fair.
So I love thee, and love is sweet

(My Florence, 't is the cruel truth) Because it can to age repeat That long-lost passion of my youth.

O, often did my spirit melt,

Blurred letters, o'er your artless rhymes! Fair tress, in which the sunshine dwelt,

I've kissed thee many a million times! And now 't is done. - My passionate tears, Mad pleadings with an iron fate, And all the sweetness of my years,

Are blackened ashes in the grate.

Then ring in the wind, my wedding chimes;
Smile, villagers, at every door;
Old churchyard, stuffed with buried crimes,
Be clad in sunshine o'er and o'er;

THE BRIDE.

FROM "THE EPITHALAMION."

LOE! where she comes along with portly pace,
Lyke Phoebe, from her chamber of the East,
Arysing forth to run her mighty race,
Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best.
So well it her beseems, that ye would weene
Some angell she had beene.

Her long loose yellow locks lyke golden wyre,
Sprinckled with perle, and perling flowres atweene,
Doe lyke a golden mantle her attyre,
And, being crowned with a girland greene,
Seem lyke some mayden queene.
Her modest eyes, abashed to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare,
Upon the lowly ground affixed are,
Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold,
But blush to heare her prayses sung so loud, -
So farre from being proud.

Nathlesse doe ye still loud her prayses sing, That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Tell me, ye merchants daughters, did ye see
So fayre a creature in your towne before;
So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as she,
Adornd with beautyes grace and vertues store?
Her goodly eyes lyke saphyres shining bright,
Her forehead yvory white,

Her cheekes lyke apples which the sun hath rudded,

Her lips lyke cherries, charming men to byte,
Her brest lyke to a bowl of creame uncrudded,
Her paps lyke lyllies budded,

Her snowie necke lyke to a marble towre,
And all her body like a pallace fayre,
Ascending up, with many a stately stayre,
To honors seat and chastities sweet bowre.
Why stand ye still, ye virgins, in amaze,
Upon her so to gaze,

Whiles ye forget your former lay to sing,
To which the woods did answer, and your eccho
ring?

EDMUND SPENSER.

HEBREW WEDDING.

FROM "THE FALL OF JERUSALEM." To the sound of timbrels sweet Moving slow our solemn feet, We have borne thee on the road To the virgin's blest abode; With thy yellow torches gleaming, And thy scarlet mantle streaming, And the canopy above Swaying as we slowly move.

Thou hast left the joyous feast,
And the mirth and wine have ceased ;
And now we set thee down before
The jealously unclosing door,
That the favored youth admits
Where the veiled virgin sits
In the bliss of maiden fear,
Waiting our soft tread to hear,
And the music's brisker din
At the bridegroom's entering in,
Entering in, a welcome guest,
To the chamber of his rest.

CHORUS OF MAIDENS.

Now the jocund song is thine,
Bride of David's kingly line;
How thy dove-like bosom trembleth,
And thy shrouded eye resembleth
Violets, when the dews of eve
A moist and tremulous glitter leave

On the bashful sealed lid!
Close within the bride-veil hid,
Motionless thou sitt'st and mute;
Save that at the soft salute
Of each entering maiden friend,
Thou dost rise and softly bend.

Hark! a brisker, merrier glee !

The door unfolds, - 't is he! 't is he!
Thus we lift our lamps to meet him,
Thus we touch our lutes to greet him.
Thou shalt give a fonder meeting,
Thou shalt give a tenderer greeting.

HENRY HART MILMAN.

MARRIAGE.

FROM "HUMAN LIFE."

the holy vow

THEN before All they stand,
And ring of gold, no fond illusions now,
Bind her as his. Across the threshold led,
And every tear kissed off as soon as shed,
His house she enters, there to be a light,
Shining within, when all without is night;
A guardian angel o'er his life presiding,
Doubling his pleasures and his cares dividing,
Winning him back when mingling in the throng,
Back from a world we love, alas! too long,
To fireside happiness, to hours of ease,
Blest with that charm, the certainty to please.
How oft her eyes read his; her gentle mind
To all his wishes, all his thoughts inclined;
Still subject, ever on the watch to borrow
Mirth of his mirth and sorrow of his sorrow!